


Cryptozoology

by Half



Series: Monsterology [1]
Category: Wynonna Earp (TV)
Genre: Alternate Universe - College/University, F/F, basically a ghost AU in a coffee shop AU in a college AU, yes Pokemon GO will show up in this
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2016-07-10
Updated: 2016-08-02
Packaged: 2018-07-22 16:38:42
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 20
Words: 34,095
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/7446238
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Half/pseuds/Half
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>When Waverly Earp starts college at the university attended by her older sister and her friends, she assumes that the most confusing and complex thing in her life will be her courses. But when the group becomes known as the campus ghost-hunting nerds and decides to embrace the title, she'll find out pretty quickly that going to class is sometimes the easiest part of a college experience.</p>
            </blockquote>





	1. Chapter 1

**Author's Note:**

> For the purposes of the AU, age difference has been compacted. Waverly is 17, Nicole is 20, Wynonna and Dolls are 21, and Doc is 22.
> 
> If you liveblog this on Tumblr please tag @youreagoodliar so I can laugh about it.

**AUGUST 14**

 

“This was a terrible idea.”

“Most of ours are.”

“I’m serious, Wynonna. Oh, god, this is so stupid. This is the stupidest mistake I’ve ever made. I can’t believe-”

“Oh, please.” Wynonna Earp interrupted her little sister, tossing her arm around her shoulders and squeezing her tightly as they walked across the campus of Ghost River University. “I’m pretty sure the stupidest mistake you’ve ever made was dating Champ Hardy in high school.”

“Mm.”

“You… _did_ break up with him, right? It _is_ past tense?”

Only a raised eyebrow answered her.

“For shit’s sake, Waverly, _why_.”

The youngest Earp shrugged. “He’s a dumbass, but he’s entertainment, at least.”

Wynonna shivered violently. “Don’t explain that sentence. Ever.”

Waverly smiled up at her before checking the time on her phone. “You should probably get started on moving me in soon.”

“Oh, _I_ should?”

“Is that not why you came?”

Wynonna gently pushed Waverly’s head forward and chuckled dryly. “You’re right.”

“Usually, but about what specifically?”

“This was a terrible idea.”

 

+++

 

Waverly’s roommate was a friendly, pleasant girl named Chrissy Nedley. The matchup pleased both of them, but horrified Wynonna.

“Tell me you aren’t the kid of Captain Jackass.”

Chrissy smirked. “Is that his nickname this year? I know it changes every Welcome Week.”

Wynonna groaned loudly and leaned against the wall instead of helping Waverly set up her television. “I don’t understand. You don’t seem like an asshole. How can you possibly be related to that douche?”

“ _Wy!_ ” Waverly scolded sharply from behind her dresser. “Can you not offend my brand new roommate before I’ve even put sheets on my bed?”

“It’s okay. I kind of expected the head of campus security to have a bit of a bad reputation among the students.” Chrissy’s smirk gained a combative edge as she stared at Wynonna. “Particularly the ones who are trouble.”

“I won’t… _argue_ … that point,” Wynonna said slowly. “Hey, Waves, are you almost done?”

“Yeah, sure, Wynonna, I’m shoved behind a dresser trying to pull cords all over the place without dropping a flatscreen, I’m fine.”

“Good; I wanted to go see if Dolls is an RA in this dorm or not.” Wynonna swung out of the room, pulling her phone out of her pocket.

Chrissy shook her head, an amused look on her face. “Your sister is, uh…”

“Trust me, I know. She’s lucky I know she loves me.” Waverly grinned at her roommate. “And for the record, I’m sure your father is just as pleasant as you are.”

“I wouldn’t go that far, but he’s a nice guy. You just have to get past his Cop Mode.” Chrissy stood on her bed to hang a few pictures of fields and forests that Waverly recognized as areas near the university. “That’s the trick, Waverly. All of those cop-types. The person they are when they’re acting like their badge is entirely different than the person they are when they forget they’re wearing one.” She turned and winked at Waverly. “You never know. Maybe you’ll get a chance to figure that out for yourself.”

Waverly scoffed. “I doubt that, but I’ll take your word for it. Thanks.”

“No problem.” Chrissy straightened her pictures just so. “We’re in college. Now’s when we get to figure things out.” She gave a gentle laugh. “What could possibly go wrong?”

 

+++

 

**AUGUST 21**

 

The first day of class had Waverly out the door an hour earlier than she needed, out of pure fear that she’d somehow get lost and be unable to find the room she was looking for in time. Chrissy, thankfully, had a similar idea, so they set out at the same time to head deeper into campus.

“You know, I’ve heard that some parts of this school are haunted.”

“I wouldn’t be surprised,” Waverly said with a shrug. “This is an old campus. Lots of history to it. It would be unrealistic to presume that there wouldn’t be a spirit or two hanging around.”

“You do believe in ghosts, then?”

“I believe that I’ve not seen good enough evidence that they don’t exist.” Waverly grinned and pulled her backpack further up on her shoulder. “I’m willing to give anything the benefit of the doubt if I have no evidence to the contrary. Well, within reason, of course.”

Chrissy laughed. “And ghosts are within reason?”

“Obviously. I don’t see why they… wouldn’t be…” Waverly trailed off, staring in the direction of one of the campus police officers. A tall, redheaded woman currently crouched down to pet the golden retriever brought to campus by one of the professors. “Who is that?” she asked in a murmur.

“The prof or the cop?”

“The cop.”

Chrissy squinted at the woman briefly. “Oh, that’s Haught.”

Waverly swallowed. “Excuse me?”

“Her name. Nicole Haught. She’s one of the interns.”

“We have… _intern_ cops?”

“Yeah, when you’re a junior or senior Criminal Justice major you can intern with campus police. You get a uniform and a car and stuff, but you only get to respond to easy things like noise complaints, and you can’t arrest anybody. It’s just something GRU started doing a few years back. Gives the future police some experience and frees up the full campus police officers to respond to stuff like drug and alcohol calls and violence, and to keep a better eye on overall school safety.”

“So essentially she’s a hall monitor, college edition.”

“Basically, yeah.” Chrissy gave her a sideways glance. “What’s your interest?”

“N-Nothing,” Waverly stammered. “Just… noticed her.”

“Mhm.” Chrissy scanned her class schedule and stopped next to one of the buildings. “This is me. I have class in a few minutes. You good?”

“Absolutely. I’ve got it all figured out.”

As Waverly waved at Chrissy and continued towards the Humanities building, she caught herself glancing back at the cop still on the ground playing with the dog. She shook her head swiftly in an attempt to clear it and forced herself to stare straight ahead.

“Come on, Waverly,” she mumbled. “Get in the game.”

She found that she was still thinking about Nicole Haught when she met her sister for lunch four hours later.

 

+++

 

“I can’t _believe_ you didn’t know that cognitive psych was going to suck,” Wynonna was saying as Waverly walked up to her.

Xavier Dolls, Wynonna’s close friend (and one of Waverly’s RAs), grunted as he continued flipping through a textbook balanced in his lap. “I figured a handful of psych courses would be a good idea and I had already taken PSYCH101. I didn’t think it would be a big deal.”

“Cognitive psych is a sophomore level course and I held off on taking it until I was a senior,” Wynonna said. “Think it through, Xavier.” She shot a grin at Waverly and patted the seat next to her. “Waves! How goes the first day?”

Waverly plopped into the chair next to her sister. “Pretty good. I’ve had my first English course and my first History course, and both were pretty interesting for freshman level courses. I have a good feeling.”

“Everybody has that feeling as a freshman,” Xavier said. “You’ll lose it by finals week.”

“Don’t listen to him.” Wynonna patted Waverly’s knee comfortingly. “Enjoy yourself, baby girl.”

“If you’re taking History classes, just don’t take Professor Montgomery,” a new voice said as a man in what seemed to be some sort of cowboy costume took a seat next to Xavier. “The woman is a god’s honest _menace_.”

Xavier snorted. “Only because she told you not to show up to her class in costume, Doc.”

“I am a _method. Actor_ ,” the man said, an air of insult to his voice. “It is a disgrace to my degree if I do not embrace my roles whole-heartedly.”

“I’m not sure that’s what method acting is,” Waverly said hesitantly.

“Darlin’, you ain’t _seen_ method acting until you’ve seen _my_ method acting.” The man held out a hand to Waverly, a smile curling his lips and his mustache. “Doc Holliday. It is a pleasure to make your acquaintance.”

Waverly smiled but didn’t take his hand. “Waverly Earp.”

“Ah.” Doc retracted his arm quickly, shooting a glance at Wynonna. “You must by Wynonna’s little sister.”

“Why, _indeed I am_.”

Wynonna and Xavier both snickered. Doc pouted. “Well. I suppose I should be getting to class.” He tipped his hat and stood. “Have a nice day.”

Once he was gone, Waverly asked, “What’s with the mustache? Even for method acting that’s a bit extreme.”

“I’m pretty sure he thinks it makes him look ‘cool’,” Xavier replied. “I almost shaved it off him once when we got him drunk at the end of finals party last year, but he didn’t write on me in Sharpie when _I_ was drunk after midterms, so I figured that would be poor sportsmanship.”

“I wish you’d done it,” Wynonna muttered. “The damn thing is _itchy_.”

Xavier and Waverly both stared at her for a long moment. “Gross, Wy,” Waverly said finally.

“Oh, shut up. You’re still dating Champ. You still lose.”

Waverly opened her mouth to argue, found that she couldn’t, and pulled out her pretty new history textbook to start her homework.

 

+++

 

**AUGUST 22**

 

The next morning saw the first shift of Waverly’s job in the campus café, working as one of the baristas. She learned the job remarkably fast (she worked in the coffee shop in her hometown, so little of the information was anything new), and by the time the café opened at 7am, she was up to speed enough to be allowed to take orders.

It all went fine until 7:20 on the dot, when Nicole Haught walked in.

Waverly hadn’t yet figured out what it was about her that just… _stuck_. The easy smile, the blue and beige uniform, the way said uniform was just _slightly_ unprofessional in a way that screamed college student (one too many buttons unbuttoned, sleeves pushed up on her forearms, the baseball cap that had the campus police emblem on it and seemed to be part of the patrol uniform tilted at just a tiny bit of an angle).

Nicole Haught’s magnetism was a puzzle, and Waverly Earp hated leaving puzzles unsolved.

“Hey there,” Nicole said as she approached the counter.

“Hi,” Waverly greeted brightly, giving Nicole the biggest grin she possessed. She wasn’t sure why; it just seemed like the right thing to do.

Except that, in response, the officer just stared blankly at her.

“Uh… Can I get you anything?”

“I-I…” Nicole visibly swallowed, glanced down, closed her eyes for a brief moment, and then looked up at the menu. “I, uh… A… cappuccino?”

“Absolutely. Coming right up.”

As Waverly turned she noticed Nicole flinch and mouth something, as if muttering something to herself. When she returned and handed the officer her drink, Nicole’s voice was much less flustered.

“Thank you. Do you work here often?”

“Every day but Tuesday.”

“Good to know.” Nicole grinned. “I’m in here every day, same time. I guess I’ll be seeing a lot of you…” she glanced at Waverly’s name tag “…Waverly.”

For some reason the fluster had apparently decided to transfer to Waverly, because she felt herself flush slightly when Nicole said her name. “A-And I you, Officer Haught.”

Nicole’s grin widened. She took her coffee and tapped the brim of her hat with a finger. “Tomorrow, then.” She turned on the heel of her boot and walked out of the shop.

Waverly shook her head slowly. “Definitely hot,” she mumbled under her breath. “ _Definitely_ hot.”


	2. Chapter 2

**SEPTEMBER 1**

 

Wynonna folded her arms across her chest as she stared up at Yancy Hall, the oldest dorm on campus and the current location for Ghost River U’s yearly construction project. As she drummed her fingers against her biceps, Xavier and Doc came up and stopped on either side of her.

“What’s got you interested in Yancy Hall?” Doc asked.

“I’ve heard that some cool stuff is in there. It might be fun to explore it.”

“The whole building is closed off due to the construction,” Xavier said. “There’s no way in there.”

Doc and Wynonna both looked at him.

“Oh. No. Guys, come on. I’m an RA. I’m supposed to do responsible things, not break into school buildings.”

“Xavier, don’t be so _boring_.” Wynonna put her hands on his shoulders, grinning. “It’s an _adventure_! We’re _seniors_! We’re supposed to have fun! Aren’t you a _little_ entertaining?”

“I’m not a ‘little’ anything,” Xavier snapped back.

She smirked and looked him up and down. “I bet you aren’t.”

Xavier groaned and put his face in his hand. Doc just snickered.

“Fine. Alright. When do you want to break into a dorm? Sign me up.”

“Well, I should think that the cover of darkness would best suit our needs,” Doc said.

“Agreed.” Wynonna put her thumbs through her belt loops and grinned up at the old building. “Tonight. One a.m. sharp. We’ll meet here and go exploring.” She grinned and put her arms around the boys’ shoulders. “It’ll be a blast, guys. You’ll see.”

 

+++

 

Yancy Hall was not exactly Fort Knox. Or even the local Whole Foods.

The only thing keeping people out of it was a thin strip of caution tape stretched across a doorway that had been knocked in with a sledgehammer, and if anybody thought that would keep college students out, they had never met a college student in their life.

“This place is creepy as shit,” Wynonna murmured, swinging the beam of her flashlight around the hallway as the trio walked through it. “They’re repairing it, but it looks even worse than it did before they started.”

“You have to break things in order to fix them, I guess,” Xavier said softly.

They made their way up to the top floor of the dorm, the sixth, and paused in front of one of the doors. A symbol none of them recognized was written on it in blood red paint.

“Well, I see that this is starting to get a bit more exciting.” Doc walked up to the door and squinted at the symbol. “Any ideas?”

“None,” Xavier replied. “Maybe it’s just a construction thing?”

“You’re joking, right?” Wynonna asked incredulously. “I’m pretty sure this is the moment in the horror film where we all get split up and systematically murdered by a psycho in a Halloween mask.”

A fourth flashlight beam joined theirs on the door, and a voice said, “What are you guys doing in here?”

“ _Fucking shit oh my fuck!_ ” Wynonna spun around, raising her flashlight above her head like a weapon.

Nicole Haught just stared at her, unimpressed.

“Jesus _Christ_ , Nicole!” Wynonna lowered the flashlight, trying to catch her panicked breath. “You scared the shit out of me.”

“We noticed,” Xavier snickered.

“You jumped a good three meters,” Doc added.

“Yeah, well, you both jumped and almost _ran away_ , so I wouldn’t judge too harshly.”

Wynonna grinned at the men. “Who’s the wuss now?”

“All three of you,” Nicole deadpanned. She turned her flashlight off and clipped it to her utility belt. “What are you guys doing? You know this building is closed.”

“We’re… uh…” Wynonna hesitated. “Hunting for ghosts!”

“Hunting for ghosts.”

“Yep!”

“… Right.” Nicole shrugged. “Whatever.”

“What are _you_ doing in here?” Xavier asked, eyeing Nicole suspiciously.

She quickly shoved her phone into her pocket. “Patrolling.”

“Do you come in here often?”

Nicole shrugged at Wynonna’s question. “Handful of nights a week.”

“Have you ever seen that before?”

For a moment, Nicole just stared at the red symbol on the door. “No; never. I’ve not seen anything like it anywhere on campus before, either.”

“This is so _weird_. I wonder what it is.”

“Well… What’s inside the room?”

The trio stared at Nicole. “We were going to check,” Wynonna insisted.

“We just wanted to make sure it was safe first. You know, that the symbol wasn’t for a safety hazard or something,” Xavier added.

“Naturally.”

Doc pushed Wynonna forward. “Ladies first.”

“Why not Nicole?”

“You’re the one you suggested this excursion, sweetheart.”

Grumbling curses under her breath, Wynonna pushed the door open. And found…

Nothing.

It wasn’t just that there were no more symbols and no dead bodies or whatever it was they had expected to find. The dorm room was completely empty. Every other room still contained beds and dressers and desks and lights.

This room didn’t even have drywall or carpeting.

“What the hell happened in here?” Xavier walked into the room and carefully ran his flashlight beam over the empty dormitory. “Is it supposed to look like this?”

“I don’t think so,” Wynonna said uneasily.

“Guys, maybe we shouldn’t be in here.” Nicole had her hand on her stun gun, a nervousness in her brown eyes that nobody present had ever seen before.

“You might just be right about that,” Doc said. “Perhaps we should leave.”

They made their way outside faster than was necessarily dignified. Once Nicole had ensured that the caution tape was still across the doorway, she joined the other three on the sidewalk.

“Out of curiosity, you guys weren’t pranking me in there, right? That actually was as creepy as it felt?”

“That was just as weird for us as it was for you,” Wynonna replied. “And I don’t even know what it was about it that felt so… _off_.”

“I’m not sure.” Xavier stared up at the building, his jaw set with concern. “But I have a feeling that we’ll find out sooner rather than later.”

 

+++

 

**SEPTEMBER 3**

 

The following Monday, Wynonna walked into the café and took a seat at the table occupied by Nicole.

“Hey. You haven’t told anybody about what happened on Saturday, right?”

Nicole scoffed. “Absolutely not. You think I want people to think I’m crazy? We saw an empty room and got freaked out by it, Wy. That’s not really something I’m going to go around trying to explain to people. Why do you ask?”

“First of all, because I feel the same way. Second of all, because there’s a rumor going around that the four of us have formed a secret ghost hunting club.”

“A _what_?”

“Yeah, like Ghostbusters, except with no equipment and no actual ghosts.”

Nicole frowned as she took a sip of her cappuccino. “How does a rumor like that even start?”

“Well, I would say that it was because I had told you that the boys and I were in that building because we were hunting ghosts, but if _they_ haven’t told anybody, and _I_ haven’t told anybody, and _you_ haven’t told anybody…”

“Then who knows you said that,” Nicole finished softly.

“Right.”

“Awesome. This just got creepier.”

“Really creepier.” Wynonna leaned back in her chair. “And why are you drinking coffee? You _hate_ coffee.”

“Oh, uh, the barista just gave it to me.”

Wynonna turned and glanced at Waverly, currently chatting with Chrissy at the counter. “She accidentally got your order wrong?”

“Not… exactly. She’s been giving me the same drink every day for over a week now. I’m pretty sure it’s on purpose.”

“Huh.” Wynonna frowned. “I honestly can’t believe that my sister would intentionally give you the wrong order.”

The word ‘sister’ had Nicole choking on her coffee. “That’s your _sister_?”

“… Yeah?”

“Oh-Okay. Good to know. Uh. Yeah.”

Wynonna squinted at her. “Why do you suddenly look like somebody hit you with a bus?”

“N-No reason.” Nicole swallowed and pushed her hat up a bit on her forehead. “Uh, she, uh, I actually placed the wrong order the first day I came in when she was working. She remembered it and now she gives me the same thing every day. I just don’t want to correct her.”

The other woman laughed loudly. “Why the hell not? It isn’t like she’ll get offended, Nic.”

“It’s not a big deal,” Nicole muttered, flushing red as she took another sip of the cappuccino.

“You’re hopeless.” Wynonna turned again and raised her voice. “Waverly!”

“God, _don’t_ -” Nicole straightened in her chair and adjusted her hat as Waverly walked over to them.

“Hey!” Waverly beamed at them. “You guys know each other?”

“Nicole’s a Psych minor; we’ve shared classes.” Wynonna pointed at Nicole’s drink. “This idiot ordered the wrong drink the first day she came in here and for some stupid reason is too embarrassed to ask you for what she actually wants.”

Waverly’s smiled faltered slightly as she looked at Nicole, who pulled her hat down a bit and flushed even redder. “Why didn’t you just _tell_ me, Officer?”

“I-It’s not a big deal,” Nicole stammered.

“You don’t even _like_ coffee.”

“ _Shut up_ ,” Nicole hissed in Wynonna’s direction.

Waverly put her hands on the table and leaned down. Nicole cleared her throat and leaned back, fidgeting with the collar of her uniform. “Officer Haught. What would you like to drink?”

“Uh… T-Tea?”

“Is that the correct order this time?”

“Y-Yeah.”

“Anything in it?”

“Three sugars.”

“Sounds like a plan.” Waverly winked at her. “I’ll bring it right over.”

“But I-” Waverly was gone before Nicole even got the words started. She looked at Wynonna, bewildered. “She’s, uh, a force to be reckoned with, isn’t she?”

Wynonna chuckled wryly. “Nic, you have absolutely _no idea_.”

Nicole spun her coffee cup slowly, staring absentmindedly at Waverly behind the counter. “I think I’d like to get one.”


	3. Chapter 3

**SEPTEMBER 5**

 

They realized the ghost-hunting rumor had spread quickly when Xavier and Nicole’s Victimology professor took a moment out of class to jokingly ask them if spirits targeted some types of people more than others. When they didn’t have an answer, he, while laughing, offered to give them extra credit if they could bring him one by the end of the semester.

He then gave them a pop quiz on details so specific that nobody in the room stood a chance of remembering any of them.

“So,” Nicole said with a sigh, sitting down on the couch the group had claimed as their daily lunch spot, “when are we going to do that research into hauntings, because this is bullshit.”

“He’s not _actually_ going to give us extra credit for that,” Xavier replied, mixing dressing into his salad.

“Uh, I’m willing to give it a shot. I didn’t remember a damn thing that was on that quiz.”

“You didn’t read the _material_ for that quiz,” Xavier pointed out.

“It was really boring.”

“What’s boring? Did Xavier try to tell a story again?” Wynonna fell onto the couch, almost knocking over the man’s bottle of water.

He grabbed it quickly and shot her a quick glare. “There’s nothing wrong with my stories. We’re talking about one of our classes.”

“Sounds boring already.” Wynonna cracked open a lunch bag that seemed to contain two donuts and nothing else. As she began to munch on one, she said, “Anything else interesting?”

“Our reputation as the campus ghost hunters has apparently spread to the professors.” Nicole brushed sandwich crumbs off of her t-shirt. “I’m not sure if this is funny or really, really awful.”

“I vote awful.” Wynonna dug into her second donut. “Where’s Doc?”

“He said something about needing to shine his boots,” Xavier replied.

Wynonna rolled her eyes. “That man. I swear.”

Waverly made her way up to the seats, gaze locked on her phone screen. “Hey, guys, can I join you? My class got cut short so my schedule’s a bit wonky today.”

“You’re such a planner, Waves.” Wynonna moved closer to Xavier to make room on the couch for her little sister. “Have a seat. Relax.”

“Thanks.” Waverly sat down, looked up, and froze.

It wasn’t that she had expected Nicole to constantly be wearing the campus police uniform. It was that she hadn’t expected what her casual clothes _were_ \- dark shorts, Converse, a v-neck t-shirt, a thin plaid button-down with the sleeves rolled up, and a GRU Phantoms basketball snapback.

That stupidly annoying magnetism puzzle trickled back into Waverly’s mind, and she found herself more determined than ever to figure out just what the hell it was that Nicole Haught had on her.

“A-Are, uh, you guys doing anything interesting?” Waverly asked, trying to keep the confusion out of her voice.

Wynonna shrugged and somehow found a third donut. “Considering buying EMF meters, dropping out of college, and becoming paranormal investigators.”

“… Is that all?”

Nicole laughed. “You’ve heard the rumor that we were searching for ghosts in Yancy Hall?”

“I think everyone has heard that rumor. Plus, Wynonna told me.” Waverly glanced down at her phone. “Everybody knows the only ghosts in Yancy Hall are Gastly,” she muttered under her breath.

She thought she saw a flicker of a smile cross Nicole’s face, but it was gone by the time she looked back up. “Right, well, we were talking about that.”

“I’m actually starting to wonder if we should do it.”

Xavier stared at Wynonna. “Drop out of school and hunt things that don’t exist?”

“I mean to look around campus for ghosts. For fun.”

“It wouldn’t be as ridiculous as it sounds,” Waverly said, leaning back against the couch. “This school is pretty well-known for potential supernatural activity, particularly hauntings.”

“It is?” all three of the others said simultaneously.

“Yes… You’re a junior and two seniors and you don’t know that?”

“Hasn’t really been high on our radar,” Wynonna retorted.

“Well, the young lady is correct.” Doc took a seat next to Nicole. “Take the theatre building, as a primary example.”

Wynonna frowned. “What’s wrong with the theatre building?”

“Why, it is _haunted_. Props disappear from the stage mere moments after they’re put out, only to reappear in the prop room. If you walk through the basement alone, you can hear footsteps followin’ behind you. And then there’s that piano.” Doc leaned forward, grinning slowly. “Sometimes, when it gets really, really quiet? You can hear a piano playin’, somewhere in the building. Only there is no piano. No radio. No source for the music at all. No explanation but the tinkering sounds of the afterlife.” He took his hat off and lowered his voice. “Now, you might be wonderin’ why a piano would an indicator of ghostly apparitions. You see, about fifty years ago, a young lady was practicing her music on the stage late at night. The janitor found her the next morning. Dead. At first the word around town was it might’ve been a suicide, but then more of the details came out. And, well… it’s a little difficult to kill yourself by stabbing yourself over a dozen times and then hiding the knife where it’ll never be found.”

For a long moment, the entire group was silent. Then, softly, Nicole asked, “Did they ever catch the killer?”

“Never,” Doc replied. “So now her spirit haunts the theatre, waiting to be released by justice. Or revenge.” He shrugged and leaned back against the couch. “At least, that’s what people say.”

“Jesus Christ, Doc.” Wynonna set down her fourth donut. “That was… a tad disturbing, but you’ve made your point. Who wants to go looking for ghosts?”

“You’re serious?” Xavier asked.

“Absolutely. You can’t tell me that after hearing Doc’s campfire story you don’t want to at least _try_.”

“It… _could_ be interesting.”

“Then let’s do it! This weekend! Everybody in?” Once all four of the others had nodded, Wynonna grinned. “Awesome. Time to bust some ghosts.”

“Don’t… don’t do that,” Waverly murmured.

“Why?”

“Just… don’t.”

 

+++

 

**SEPTEMBER 6**

 

Nicole pushed back the brim of her cap and rubbed at her eyes, willing her paper to write itself.

“I know that look.” Waverly sat down across from her and sat a tea down on the table. “Your usual.”

“You don’t need to hand deliver that every day, you know,” Nicole said with a laugh, reaching for her wallet in her messenger bag.

Waverly waved her off. “It’s already paid for.”

“You didn’t have to-”

“Nicole, shut up. It’s a tea.”

“Well, thanks.” Nicole fidgeted with the collar of her uniform. “What ‘look’ do I have?”

“The ‘I’m regretting signing up for college’ look. You see it a lot in this café.”

Nicole laughed. “It’s a Psych paper. It kind of sucks. I’m hoping my laptop gains sentience and starts writing for me.”

“If your laptop gains sentience, I don’t think doing homework is going to be the first thing it decides to do,” Waverly replied with a grin.

“You never know.” Nicole closed her computer and slid it into her bag. “Screw it. I’ll do it after my shift.”

“Isn’t your shift in like… two hours?”

“Yeah. Doesn’t mean I want to spend those two hours doing homework.”

Waverly laughed. “You’re sure you aren’t a senior?”

Nicole shrugged. “Feels like it some days.” She took a sip of her tea. “So, just so you know, there are, in fact, Gastly in Yancy Hall. Only a few, though. It’s mostly Zubat.”

“Figures.” The words registered to Waverly, and she blushed. “You _did_ hear me yesterday.”

“Of course. I take it you’re a fan.”

“I had a pet hamster when I was a kid that was named Pikachu.”

“My first pet cat was named Flareon.”

Waverly snickered quietly. “Your last name is ‘Haught’ and you named your cat after a Fire-type?”

“Yeah, well, shut up. I was a small, innocent child.”

After a moment, Waverly said, “I can name all 721 Pokemon.”

Nicole shook her head slowly, grinning. “No you can’t.”

“Yes I can! _In National Pokedex number order!_ ” Waverly took in a breath, her eyes sparking with determination. “Bulbasaur, Ivysaur, Venusaur, Charmander…”

 

+++

 

“Hey, Xavier, are you sure you’re okay with this Saturday plan?” Wynonna asked, following him into the café.

“I said I was, didn’t I?”

“Well, yeah, but you don’t really show a lot of… emotion? All the time? So your enthusiastic ‘okay’ looks an awful lot like your miserable ‘okay’. And I just want to make sure that you’re… y’know. Okay.”

Xavier smiled slightly. “I’m not sure that entirely made sense, but I swear, I’m okay.”

“Good.”

“You want a black coffee, right?”

“I want an _Irish_ coffee, but a black coffee will work for right now.” Wynonna grinned. “I’ll go steal a table. I think I saw Nicole and Waverly when we walked in; maybe we can join them.”

“Sounds good.”

As Wynonna walked over to the table occupied by her sister and the campus cop, Waverly was saying, “…Zygarde, Diancie, Hoopa, Volcanion. There’s going to be more, of course, but we don’t know exactly how many yet, and we don’t know, of the new ones that have been announced, where they’ll be in the order.”

Nicole smirked at her. “You mixed up the order of the elemental monkeys. Panpour and Simipour come before Pansear and Simisear.”

“ _What?_ No… No I…” Waverly frowned and bit her lip. “Did I? Hold on. Bulbasaur, Ivysaur, Venusaur- wait, I did _not_. Pansear and Simisear _do_ come before Panpour and Simipour.”

The other woman was already laughing softly, her head bowed slightly and her eyes averted from Waverly’s gaze. “Yeah, I know. I just… like listening to your voice.”

Waverly gave her a wide smile. Before she could respond, Wynonna sat down at the table. “You’re both nerds. I bet you both have that dumb app thing, too.”

“Uh, it’s called Pokemon GO, and it’s amazing,” Waverly retorted, taking out her phone.

“It’s geocaching with shiny objects and crappy servers attached to it.”

“Pessimist.”

“She’s not wrong,” Nicole said, playing with her own phone. “My server crashed just as I was about to claim the Gym at the library last night. It was not a good time.”

Waverly slammed her hand down on the table, making Wynonna and Nicole jump. “It’s _you_! _You’re_ the one who keeps taking that Gym from me!”

Nicole smiled innocently. “I don’t know what you mean.” She winked at Wynonna. “Team Mystic took your Gym, Wave.”

“Give me your phone, Nicole.”

“Why?”

“I want to see your username.”

“Absolutely not.”

“ _Give me your phone, you Team Mystic asshole._ ”

“Would you look at that, Team Valor has the library, somebody should do something to fix that.” Laughing, Nicole tossed her bag over her shoulder and grabbed her tea in her empty hand. She scrambled out of her chair and towards the door with Waverly on her heels, lunging for the taller woman’s cell phone.

Wynonna shook her head and leaned back in her chair. “Nerds.”

 

+++

 

After dinner that night, Waverly sat on her bed, staring at her phone. Once Chrissy had left the room to shower, Waverly scrolled through the contacts and hit a number she, honestly, hadn’t thought about once in over a week.

And finally broke up with her high school boyfriend.

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> 1 - I did in fact put Nicole in the gayest casual clothes I could think of.  
> 2 - Nicole was playing Pokemon GO when she met up with the group in chapter two.  
> 3 - The haunted theatre building is 100% real it was at my college and I had night classes there and it was creepy as shit.


	4. Chapter 4

**SEPTEMBER 8**

Waverly found herself feeling strangely grateful when she showed up at Remington Hall on Saturday and found that Nicole’s casual clothing was much less… _whatever it was_ that had stressed her out on Wednesday. The Criminal Justice major was still wearing the basketball hat and Converse, but she had traded the rest of her outfit for dark jeans and a plain gray t-shirt.

“What exactly is the plan here?” Nicole asked, staring up at the building. “Go in, stand on the stage, ask if there are any ghosts?”

“Have you never seen a single ghost chaser show?”

“No, Wynonna, I watch _good_ television.”

Wynonna made a scandalized noise. “Nicole, I’m sorry, but we are not friends anymore.”

Nicole just shrugged.

“We’re going to go in there and wait the night, or at least a few hours, and see if we see or hear anything suspicious,” Xavier said. “We should split up, though. One group in the basement near the prop room; one group on the stage.” He pointed at Nicole. “Congrats, you get Wynonna and the dark basement.”

“Aw, come on-”

“I’m taking Waverly and Doc and heading for the stage.”

The three left, Waverly glancing back twice at her sister and Nicole before they got instead the building.

“Notice that he _didn’t_ the one who doesn’t watch ghost chasing shows,” Wynonna mumbled.

“Didn’t take you, either, Earp,” Nicole snarked back.

“Oh, shut up. Let’s go in the creepy haunted basement.”

 

+++

 

The creepy haunted basement was less dark than they had initially expected. Security lights kept the hallways barely lit with a pale yellow glow.

“I’m just going to say it,” Wynonna whispered. “Darkness would have been less freaky than this.”

“Total agreement from me.”

They walked through the basement, occasionally catching themselves holding their breath, until they got to the door of the prop room.

“If the only haunting thing about the prop room is that things move back into place, what’s the point of staking out down here?” Nicole asked.

“Hm. Maybe we should go inside to wait?”

“Uh, do _you_ have a key to the theatre prop room, because I-”

Wynonna pulled a small packet out of her back pocket and crouched down in front of the door.

“Where did you get a lockpick.”

“Amazon.”

“Somehow, I’m not surprised.”

They found their way inside the prop room, and Wynonna carefully moved several props to different locations. “There. Now we have bait for the ghost.”

“Yeah, because tempting fate this badly is a _great_ plan.”

“You agreed to come, Haught.”

“I didn’t think of how awful of an idea it was until I was already here.”

Wynonna patted her on the shoulder. “Welcome to the true meaning of being friends with me.”

 

+++

 

Waverly, Doc, and Xavier set up a camp of sorts in the center of the stage, complete with blankets and bags of chips. As they lay staring at the dark lights above them, Waverly said, “You know, even if we don’t find anything, I’m glad we decided to do this.”

“And why would that be?” Doc asked through a mouthful of corn chip.

“It’s fun, doing stupid stuff with friends. This is kind of what I always expected college to be like.”

Xavier chuckled. “You mean you expected to break into school buildings waiting for ghosts to show up?”

“Maybe not that _exactly_ , but the atmosphere? Hanging out with people I care about? Absolutely.”

“Glad you’re enjoying yourself.” Doc pulled his hat down over his eyes. “Because as haunted as this building truly is, we’re not likely to have a very eventful night.”

It was then, as if on cue, that they heard the faint sounds of piano music filtering through the stage.

And then, moments later, screaming.

 

+++

 

It had been over thirty minutes since they entered the prop room when Wynonna and Nicole first heard the footsteps in the hallway outside. Nicole smacked the arm of a dozing Wynonna, staring at the door and trying not to look like fear had just spiked through her.

“Whaisit?” Wynonna mumbled.

“Don’t you hear that?” Nicole hissed.

Wynonna was up and at attention in milliseconds, her hand gripping her flashlight. “What the hell is that? Is that the others? That’s gotta be the others, right?”

“I… hope so.” Nicole turned her hat backwards and crouched down to peer through the thin gap under the door. “I don’t see anyone, though.”

The footsteps got louder, until they sounded like they were coming from just outside the door.

“Anything?” Wynonna asked in a whisper.

“Nothing.”

And the door lock clicked back into place.

“ _Shit, holy shit, fuck!_ ” Nicole scrambled away from the door, banging into Wynonna and tumbling onto the floor.

“What? What is it? Jesus, Nicole, what the shit-”

“There wasn’t anybody outside,” Nicole managed between panicked gasps for breath.

Wynonna stared at her for a long moment. “You’re messing with me, right?”

“ _No! There was nobody in front of the door when it locked!_ ”

A faint scraping sound came from behind them, and they turned around. The prop pine tree that they had moved to the right side of the room was slowly sliding its way back to its place on the left. Just when that calmed down, everything else they had moved started to return to its original position.

Whatever bravado was left in Wynonna and Nicole vanished. They both started to scream.

 

+++

 

Xavier, Doc, and Waverly made it down to the basement quickly once the shouting started. It only took Doc a few seconds and one of Waverly’s hairpins to get the prop room door open.

Wynonna and Nicole practically fell out of the room, scrambling to get away from it in a desperate panic. Xavier grabbed Nicole and Doc grabbed Wynonna, stopping them before they ended up hurting themselves.

“Hey, calm down! Nicole! Look at me! _Nicole!_ ” Xavier snapped his fingers in front of Nicole’s face, bringing her focus to him. “Just breathe, okay?”

Doc was barely managing to get words out to sooth Wynonna. She was fighting him in a fit of fear. “Hell, Xavier, I can’t even stop her long enough to talk to her.”

“Waverly, get Nicole.” Xavier didn’t wait long enough to see if Waverly would follow his instructions, instead immediately getting up and hurrying over to help Doc calm Wynonna down.

Waverly didn’t hesitate; she knelt down next to Nicole’s head (moving the backwards snapback off of her head before she hurt herself) and gently put a hand on the other woman’s shoulder.

“Nicole, it’s okay. You’re okay.”

“Everything was moving,” Nicole whispered.

“What?”

Nicole swallowed, her panicked breaths slowly starting to regain control. “We moved stuff around in there. Shut ourselves in. Heard footsteps. Somebody… the door locked. Then everything started moving back where it belonged. All by themselves.”

A shiver ran through Waverly’s spine, and she gently started running her fingers over Nicole’s hair. “Shhhh. It’s gonna be okay.” Behind her, she heard Xavier and Doc get Wynonna under control, and heard her repeat the same, terror-filled story. “It’s gonna be okay,” she repeated softly.

As Nicole closed her eyes and rested her head against the basement floor, Waverly glanced at the prop room. And regretted calling this excursion “fun”.


	5. Chapter 5

**SEPTEMBER 9**

 

In the light of day, Wynonna and Nicole both insisted that they had merely overreacted to the creepiness of the dark basement, their minds playing tricks on them and fooling them into hearing sounds that were never there.

The dark, honest horror in their eyes made it obvious to the others that they were lying.

“Are you sure you’re okay?” Waverly asked Wynonna as she sat down next to her in the café. “I saw you last night. You looked really freaked out. That’s unlike you.”

“Aw, you know me. Always have been a bit dramatic. Like, remember after Daddy and Willa died? I insisted that the men who broke into our house had actually been demons?” Wynonna gave a dry, humorless laugh. “God, that was a hilarious bit of a drama queen phase, wasn’t it?”

Waverly didn’t smile. “They zapped your brain with electricity for that, Wy.”

“Yeah, well, small town psych sucks.” Wynonna took out her textbook and flipped it open to the current chapter. “That’s why I’m going to make it better,” she murmured.

The youngest Earp reached out and gently rested her hand on top of her sister’s. For several minutes, they just sat like that in silence, pretending that everything was fine.

“Are you guys alright?”

It was a question asked so softly that at first Waverly almost didn’t hear it. She looked up and saw Nicole standing next to them, hands nervously gripping her utility belt and eyes full of concern.

“We’re fine,” Waverly answered in a quiet voice. She gestured at the empty chair at the table. “You’re welcome to join us.”

Nicole took a seat and joined in the silence for a long moment. Then she started laughing.

“What’s so funny?” Wynonna asked without looking up from her book.

“Nothing really. I just realized that the fan of ghost chasing shows didn’t think that shutting herself in a room and daring a ghost to show up was a good way to jinx herself.”

“Uhm, excuse me, how _else_ was I supposed to find a ghost? Hope that it’s attracted to your sarcasm?”

Nicole leaned forward, smirking. “If ghosts were attracted to sarcasm, you would’ve been possessed a long time ago.”

Waverly snorted laughter into her coffee and had to put it down before she choked. Wynonna glared at her. “Both of you can go to hell. And you, Haught, maybe could’ve stopped me from shutting us in a room that we thought was haunted? You’re supposed to be the responsible one; try watching my ass next time.”

“First of all, I’ve _never_ been the responsible one. Second of all, I will _gladly_ watch your ass. It’s top shelf in terms of quality.”

Wynonna rolled her eyes. “Seriously.”

Nicole shrugged and leaned back in her chair. “Yeah. I may not be interested, but I’m gay, not blind.”

“Hey!” Wynonna sounded offended. “Why aren’t you interested?”

“Just not.” Nicole winked at Waverly, and she felt herself flush. “Though now that I know it bothers you, Wy, I’m going to have fun with it.”

“Shut up, Nicole.”

“Gladly, darlin’.”

Waverly choked on her coffee again.

“You’re a jackass,” Wynonna said affectionately, smacking the brim of Nicole’s hat and pushing it down on her face. “Don’t you have, like, crime to fight or something?”

“Uh, depends,” Nicole said with a sigh. “Is that Psych paper I still didn’t write yet a crime?”

“Possibly. Your attention issues are _definitely_ one.”

“I try. Sometimes.” Nicole adjusted her hat and stood. “I should go the library and finish that up before I have to drive around campus yelling at kids to be quiet.” She smirked at Waverly. “Maybe I’ll even strengthen up the Gym while I’m there.”

“You can try,” Waverly said with a slow grin. “Except I took it back this morning, and my CP 952 Blastoise is waiting for you.”

“You. _Bastard_.” Nicole pulled her phone out and walked away, frantically tapping on the screen and muttering under her breath.

Waverly watched her go with an absent smile on her face, trying not to think about why exactly it mattered to her that she now knew for a fact that Nicole was gay.

 

+++

 

Xavier walked out of his Sociology classroom and found Doc waiting in the hallway for him, leaning against the wall. He immediately knew something was wrong, because Doc was holding his hat instead of wearing it, and he was in a t-shirt under a vest instead of his normal dress shirt and jacket combo.

“Your character is slipping, Doc,” Xavier said, starting for the door out of the building.

Doc followed next to him. “It seemed in poor taste today. How did your group meeting go?”

“Could’ve been better. I’ll probably end up doing the whole project myself.”

“That’s how it always goes.” Doc sighed, tapping his hat against his leg. “You don’t believe them either, do you?”

He knew exactly what the other man was saying, but Xavier still asked, “Who?”

“Wynonna and Nicole. You don’t believe that they were imagining things.”

Xavier was silent for a long moment. “No. I don’t. You say the looks on their faces when we got them out of that room. Whatever happened in there wasn’t just a few spooky noises.”

“How do we get them to admit it?”

“Do you really want them to? They were terrified.”

“I’m aware of that.” Doc stopped and put out a hand to make Xavier stop as well. “But if it’s real? If there really is something in that building? On this campus? How do we ignore that? What if it’s _real_ , Xavier?”

“What if it is?” Xavier asked sharply. “What exactly do you plan on doing about it, John Henry? Are you going to tell the campus? They already think we’re all nuts, and the ghost hunting thing was a _joke_. What’s going to happen if we start taking it seriously and they find out about?”

Doc stared at him. “I… didn’t know any of you knew my real name.”

“I’m a Criminal Justice major. If I can’t figure out something as stupid as your _name_ , I should drop out of school.”

“… Fair enough.” Doc put his hat back on his head. “As for your questions… I don’t know. I just think we owe it to ourselves and to the people who go to this school to find out.”

“Maybe we do. But that’s a decision we need to come to as a group, don’t you think?”

“Absolutely. I just wanted your opinion on it first.”

“Why?”

“Maybe I respect you, Mr. Dolls.”

“No, that’s not it. Why?”

Doc laughed. “Maybe I just wanted to make sure I didn’t sound like a damn fool before I was talking in front of the ladies.”

“That makes much more sense.”

 

+++

 

**SEPTEMBER 11**

 

They didn’t bring it up until lunch on Tuesday.

“Basically, I think maybe we should look into the possibility. Ensure that the campus isn’t actually plagued by evil spirits.”

“Doc, we told you,” Wynonna said quietly. “Nothing actually happened.”

Xavier gave her a humorless smile. “And you expect us to believe that?”

“Yeah, I do-”

A student next to them accidentally dropped the textbook he was trying to balance on his head, and it slammed onto his table with a loud bang. Wynonna and Nicole both jumped, Wynonna actually shoving Xavier between her and the noise and Nicole all but slamming into Waverly’s shoulder.

As they both sheepishly slid back into their regular seats, Xavier said, “Sure, yeah, we believe it.”

“Look… we just…” Wynonna shot a glance at Nicole, who shrugged. With a sigh, she said, “We have no idea _what_ happened, okay? There was no one in that hallway, but the door locked. It locked us in, and then every prop we had moved started moving back to its original position. By itself. I’m not one to believe in shit like that, but I… Guys, you have _no idea_.”

“It is real, then,” Doc said. “The theatre _is_ haunted.”

Nicole sighed and rubbed the back of her neck. “I’m not sure that I’d be willing to say that out loud, but I’ve also never seen a tree slid itself across a room on its own power before, so unless my courses have driven me to a breaking point _very_ early in the semester… yeah, there’s something wrong with that building.”

“There’s probably something ‘wrong’ with Yancy Hall, too,” Waverly said. “You guys mentioned some weird stuff in there too, right.”

A long silence answered her.

“Great,” Wynonna said through gritted teeth. “I make it to my senior year on my own accord, and I’m going to get murdered by ghosts before I can even graduate.”

Waverly bit her lip. “I have an idea. Why don’t we wait until next month. Let our nerves cool off a bit. Get settled into this semester. Then we go back to the theatre and Yancy Hall and see if they’re still as creepy on completely different nights in completely different circumstances. And we’ll stay together as a group this time.”

“Works for me,” Wynonna said.

“And me,” Nicole agreed quickly.

Xavier and Doc exchanged a glance. “Well, alright then,” Doc said. “If that’s what will make y’all comfortable, we’ll do it. Hopefully we can all have a nice, peaceful rest of our September.”

Wynonna snorted and took a sip of her soda. “What school do you go to?”


	6. Chapter 6

**Notes for the Chapter:**

> Waverly is canonically a Virgo, so her birthdate on the SyFy website is wrong. So I just assigned her a Virgo birthday. Nicole's birth month was picked randomly for the convenience of the fic.

**SEPTEMBER 19**

 

The group managed not to stumble upon any more ghosts in the following days, but the routine they established was interrupted in the middle of the week when they got to Waverly’s eighteenth birthday.

She insisted that she didn’t want any gifts, she just wanted all of her friends to get together for pizza and soda and relaxing conversation that in no way involved even so much as the potential for evil spirits.

Xavier volunteered Nicole’s off-campus housing, and Waverly got her wish.

Nicole’s housing was a small half of a condo that she lived in by herself. The other half had been rented out to another student, but he had been kicked out for a reason that she refused to explain before classes had even started.

(Rumor was that it involved trying to grow drugs in her side of the yard so that she’d get blamed when the cops inevitably showed up, not realizing that she would notice it long before it became a viable explanation. He had very likely been on drugs when inventing this plan in the first place.)

The Earp sisters were the first ones there, Wynonna carrying a cake way too large for the number of people that would be in attendance. She headed for the kitchen, mumbling a quick greeting at Nicole from behind the box.

Waverly sat down on Nicole’s couch and was promptly jumped on by a small brown cat that curled up in her lap.

“Oh, geez, I’m sorry, she doesn’t usually do that,” Nicole said immediately, walking over to them. “Calamity-”

“She’s fine,” Waverly said softly, petting the cat between the ears with a finger. “Her name’s Calamity?”

“Yeah.”

“I like it.” Waverly leaned down and started whispering to the cat, a small smile on her face. She glanced up, and noticed that Nicole was just staring at her. “What?”

“N-Nothing. Uh. She’s fine. I guess. Just don’t let her near Doc or Xavier.”

Waverly laughed. “Why, she doesn’t like men?”

“Not especially,” Nicole said seriously.

“Your cat is gay, Nic.”

“Well, you know, like mother.” Nicole grinned at her and walked into the kitchen to prevent Wynonna from breaking everything in the fridge as she tried to shove the cake into it.

Waverly watched her, and this time actually did think about it.

 

+++

 

After dinner and cake, Xavier, Doc, Chrissy, Waverly, and Wynonna commandeered the living room for what would, in the future, be known as the single most vicious game of Monopoly ever played.

“Are you sure you don’t want to play?” Xavier asked Nicole.

She held up her hands. “I’m smarter than that. Plus, I’m on call, hence the uniform, so I can’t really afford to get absorbed in paying property tax.”

It ended up being a very good decision. Waverly actually managed to reduce Doc to tears as she stole money right from under him, and when she had command of literally half of the board, she started laughing evilly.

“This is just what I’ll do in a _game_. Imagine what I can do in _real life_. And to make it worse, I can _vote_ now, assholes. I have _actual power_.”

All color drained from Nicole’s face. After a brief moment where she just stared at Waverly, she slipped out of the living room and into the kitchen.

Chrissy, who had gone bankrupt at Xavier’s hands several turns earlier, followed her curiously. “Are you okay? You look like somebody just punched you in the gut.”

“Waverly just turned _eighteen_?”

“Yeah…” Chrissy’s eyes widened. “Oh, shit. You didn’t know how old she was, did you?”

Nicole just shook her head slowly. “I had a crush on a _child_ ,” she said hoarsely.

“It’s not really quite that dramatic. You turned 20 in, what, July, right? So you were _barely_ twenty and Waverly was _almost_ eighteen. Kinda weird, but not as awful as you seem to think it was.” Chrissy laughed. “Though, if you thought she already _was_ eighteen, it doesn’t really explain why you haven’t already asked her out. If you had known she was seventeen and were waiting, that would make sense. The real scenario is just kind of dumb on your part.”

“Wait, hold on, you thought I was waiting for Waverly to turn eighteen so that I could ask her out? You realize the sounds _incredibly_ creepy, right?”

“Oh, _relax_ , Nicole. And besides, it doesn’t even matter now. Wave’s a full-fledged adult, you haven’t done anything wrong, now get your idiot brain in gear.”

Her words finally clicked fully to Nicole. “You knew. This whole time.”

“Knew what?”

“That I have a crush on Waverly.”

“Sweetheart, I think the only people who _don’t_ know are Waverly- who is chronically confused despite how smart she is –and Wynonna, the most oblivious person on the planet. I’m thinking it’s just an Earp thing.”

“But I…” Nicole swallowed and fidgeted with her hat. “ _How?_ I barely even _know_ you.”

“Uh, because you go into the café every single fricking day at the exact same time and then sit at a table to drink your tea and stare at Waverly like you’re planning out your entire future together.” Chrissy squinted. “I’m guessing two kids, a dog, and a cat.”

Nicole cleared her throat, pulling at the collar of her uniform, her face flushed almost as red as her hair. “I don’t… stare…”

Chrissy laughed. “Sure, Nicole. Just talk to her before you hurt yourself.”

“She _just_ turned eighteen, do you know how that’s gonna look-”

“Oh, for Christ’s sake.” Chrissy grabbed Nicole’s hat off of her head and walked into the living room.

“ _Chrissy!_ ”

She set the hat down on Waverly’s head and took a seat on the couch next to her. Nicole stopped dead in the doorway as Waverly absentmindedly adjusted the hat so that it was in the proper position, still focused on the game.

If she asked for it back, she’d have to fight for it. If she continued to stand there, she’d have to suffer through the visual of Waverly wearing an article of her clothing.

Nicole turned on her heel and walked out the door to stand on the porch and get some air.

 

+++

 

She was still out there, siting on the railing lost in her thoughts, an hour and a half later after pretty much everyone had left.

Waverly was the last one out the door, still wearing Nicole’s hat, carrying her cat. “I think I might steal her,” she said.

“Damn cat seems to like you more than she likes me. You can have her.”

A light laugh came in response, and Waverly set the cat back in the house. She stood next to Nicole for a long moment, looking out at the street. “Thanks for having us.”

“I was volunteered, but trust me, it wasn’t a problem.”

“Where’d you disappear to?”

“Oh, uh.” Nicole fidgeted with her collar. “I came out here to think for a minute, and I lost track of time. I’m sorry.”

“It’s okay.” Waverly gave her a sideways glance. “I wish you had stayed, though.”

“I’m sorry,” Nicole repeated.

They just sat there in the chilled September night air, in complete silence for what felt like another hour. Then, softly, Nicole said, “You look nice today. You look nice everyday, but… still.”

“Thank you,” Waverly whispered. They stared at each other for another long moment, one that broke when Waverly gave a slightly self-conscious smile and pulled the brim of the hat down on her forehead. “I think the police cap really brings together the whole outfit.”

Nicole laughed. “Absolutely. Without that, you’d have nothing.”

Waverly grinned and took the hat off, beginning to play with it in her hands. “I saw that I had Chrissy to thank for it. I hope you didn’t mind.”

“I’m pretty sure it’s theft of police property, but I think I’ll let her off the hook.”

“Good. I think that’s fair provided you get it back.”

Nicole shrugged, still smiling. “Which is only true if I ever actually do get it back.”

Waverly gave a soft chuckle and carefully put the hat backwards onto Nicole’s head. “There. Very professional.”

“That _is_ how I live my life.”

“Oh, definitely.” Waverly’s hands lingered for a moment, adjusting the ball cap so that it sat just right. Then, trembling, her hands moved down to Nicole’s face, and she pulled her forward and kissed her.

It was over as quickly as it had started, and in seconds Waverly was down the steps and at her Jeep. By the time Nicole processed that it had even happened, the other woman was gone.


	7. Chapter 7

**SEPTEMBER 20**

 

Nicole didn’t come into the café the following day.

Waverly burned herself on the coffee pot twice, distracted by checking every time someone walked in to see if it was going to be her.

She didn’t know why she had done it. What had _possessed_ her to… Well, she was smart enough to figure out that there was really only one reason for someone to impulsively kiss another person. She just wasn’t sure she was ready to deal with it.

She had feelings for Nicole Haught. And hell, she was already handling them terribly.

There was no excuse for how badly she had done at figuring out what was going on. It so perfectly explained the damn magnetism puzzle. It wasn’t a puzzle at all.

Waverly Earp was just a goddamn idiot.

(Who totally _knew_ that if she put that hat on Nicole’s head backwards, put the brim out of the way, she’d probably end up kissing her. It didn’t stop her from doing it. It didn’t stop her from being a _goddamn idiot_.)

So she set her jaw, shook her head clear, and tried to stop staring at the door.

 

+++

 

Somehow, Waverly made it through her shift without setting herself on fire. When she stepped out of the café, the first thing she noticed was that Nicole was on the other side of the quad, in her uniform and pinned to the ground by Professor Joshi’s German Shepherd puppy.

“Shit,” Waverly mumbled under her breath.

Nicole noticed her, and the grin on her face faded to a troubled look. She carefully removed the puppy from her torso, said something to the professor that Waverly couldn’t hear, and walked off in the opposite direction.

“Double shit,” Waverly sighed.

“Everything alright?” Doc asked, coming to a stop next to her.

Waverly jumped and quickly tried to recover by smoothing out her skirt. “Absolutely. Where are you headed?”

“Lunch. It’s the meal we eat at this time of day, if you recall.”

“Yeah. Uh. I usually eat it after class, so I should get going.”

Doc touched her arm lightly before she could walk away. “Are you certain you’re okay?”

“I’m fine, Doc. Go to lunch. I’ll see you guys later.” Waverly shot one last glance in Nicole’s direction, and noticed that she had disappeared from view completely. “Probably. I might be having dinner with Chrissy.” She turned and hurried off to class before he could ask her any more questions.

 

+++

 

**SEPTEMBER 22**

 

Waverly made it to Saturday before cracking and asking Wynonna for help.

“She doesn’t come into the café anymore, at least not when I’m working there. And she hasn’t taken the Gym at the library from me _once_ since Wednesday.”

Wynonna took a sip from of coffee, frowning. “It doesn’t seem like Nicole to stop playing that dumb game, especially when she has an opportunity to kick your ass at it.”

“Stop calling it dumb,” Waverly said, more on reflex than anything else. She folded her arms across her chest. “You’ve seen her, right? Does she seem okay?”

“Actually… she’s sort of… been ‘busy’ a lot this week.”

Waverly stared at her sister. “So she’s been avoiding you guys so that she doesn’t run into me.”

“You don’t know that,” Wynonna pointed out.

“Look, I… I need to know what went wrong, Wy. And I just… I can’t ask her. I just can’t, and besides, I can’t get within fifty feet of her without her running away, so it’s not like I could even try.”

Wynonna reached out and gripped her hand. “I’ll talk to her, okay? If anything, just to kick her ass for avoiding the rest of us. If she wants to ignore you, that’s fine. I ignore you all the time.”

Waverly gave a weak laugh. “Thanks, Wynonna.”

“You don’t have _any_ idea what’s going on?”

“None,” Waverly replied, just a bit too quickly.

She immediately felt guilty, for Nicole’s sake. She knew that what was going on was entirely her fault, but she couldn’t admit that to Wynonna. Not yet. She didn’t know for sure what the reaction would be, and while she truly did believe that her big sister would be more than accepting… She needed more time to accept it herself, first.

“Alright. Just don’t worry about it, okay? The dumbass probably just got suspended from her internship for breaking into abandoned buildings to catch Pokemon or something and is too embarrassed to face us.”

Waverly grinned, though she knew it looked forced. The concern in Wynonna’s eyes deepened, but instead of asking further, she squeezed Waverly’s hand, stood, and walked out of the café.

 

+++

 

She found Nicole in the small cafeteria on the top floor of the library, hunched over a victimology textbook.

Without fanfare, Wynonna sat down across from her and asked, “Why are you avoiding my sister?”

Nicole closed her book slowly. “Uh… I’m not.”

“Mm, yeah, not sure I buy that.”

“Why not?”

“Because you’ve been mysteriously ‘busy’ for the entire back half of the week. And apparently, you haven’t stepped foot in the café, which is weird because you’re there pretty much every single day.” Wynonna leaned forward. “What’s going on with you?”

Nicole toyed with her hat, sitting next to her on the table. “Nothing. I’m fine.”

“Okay. Then why have you been avoiding Waverly?”

“I _haven’t_ been.”

“But you _have_.”

The campus cop groaned and put her textbook away in her bag. “Just leave it alone, Wy.”

“Okay, new question. Why won’t you _tell_ me why you’re avoiding my sister?” Wynonna’s eyes narrowed. “Jesus, you didn’t try to screw her or something, did you?”

“ _What?_ Christ, Wynonna, _no_! Why would you even _think_ that?”

“I’m trying to think of what could possibly make Waverly so worried that she calls me in to talk to you instead of hunting you down and kicking your ass herself. And what would make somebody like you cut yourself off from your friends without a word of legit explanation.”

Nicole stared down at her hands in silence. Then she put her hat back on, pulling it down until it shadowed her eyes. “Look,” she murmured, “if you don’t know why I’m avoiding Waverly, she clearly didn’t tell you. And it’s not my place to do that for her.” Without another word, she got up from the table and walked away.

 

+++

 

Waverly almost fell off of her bed as Wynonna stormed into her dorm room. “Shit, Wynonna, could you knock?”

“I barge into your room all the time when we’re at home.”

“Yeah, but this is Chrissy’s room, too. Come on.”

“Chrissy is in class, and we both know that.” Wynonna sat down on the foot of Waverly’s bed. “You lied to me.”

Waverly closed her laptop and set it on her desk. She leaned back against the wall and folded her arms across her chest. “What about?”

“Not knowing why Nicole’s avoiding you.”

Her blood ran cold. “She told you?”

“No.” Wynonna’s eyes were sad. “She told me that I would have to ask you, because it wasn’t her place to tell me.” She reached out, gently patting Waverly’s knee. “Come on, baby girl. Talk to me.”

The options battled rapidly in Waverly’s head before she finally decided on the one she realized was the only viable one: the truth.

“I kissed her,” she whispered, so quietly it was almost inaudible.

“What?”

Waverly cleared her throat and was surprised by how weak her voice sounded when she repeated, “I kissed her and then ran away like a coward.”

“… Oh.”

Waverly gave what she thought was a casual laugh and looked down. “I should return those Gryffindor sweatpants, I guess.”

There was no response from Wynonna. Then, after a lengthy pause, her grip on Waverly’s knee tightened. “I’m not so sure about that,” she said gently. “I take it Nic wasn’t expecting it?”

“Not exactly. I wasn’t really expecting it either,” Waverly admitted. “I just… did it.”

“Do you… What do you want to do?”

“I don’t know.” Waverly released a strained, exhausted laugh that held no humor in it. “God, Wynonna, I don’t know. I think I like her. Like, _really_ like her. And I probably ruined any chance at following through on it, and I… I don’t know what to do.”

“You’ll figure it out. I’ll help, if you want.” Wynonna dragged Waverly across to bed so that she could hug her tightly. “It’s going to be okay, sis. I promise you, it’s all going to work itself out.”

 

+++

 

**SEPTEMBER 23**

 

“You’re a fucking idiot.”

Nicole mumbled a curse under her breath as a Vulpix ran away from her phone. She looked up at Wynonna, walking up to her in front of Yancy Hall. “Uh. Hello to you, too.”

Wynonna got closer to her, pulled back, and landed a solid punch to Nicole’s shoulder.

“ _Ow!_ Jesus _Christ_ , Wynonna, what the _hell_?”

“You’re a _fucking idiot_.” Wynonna grabbed Nicole by the collar of her uniform and pulled her forward. “Are you kidding me, Nicole? Waverly kisses you and runs away and your response is to treat her like she’s got the goddamn plague? What is _wrong_ with you?”

Nicole swallowed, regret so plain in her eyes that Wynonna almost let her go. “That wasn’t my intention,” she murmured.

“Well then what the hell was, because whatever you thought you were doing didn’t work.”

“Look, she… she scared the hell out of me, Wynonna. Only like an hour beforehand, I had _just_ realized that I had been crushing on her before she was even _legal_. And then she… I just, I didn’t want it to look like I had been waiting in the wings for her to turn eighteen, like I was just hovering around her solely for that purpose. I _panicked_ when she kissed me, okay? I panicked. It’s stupid, I get that, but I didn’t know what else to do.”

Wynonna hit her upside the head, so hard that it knocked the hat off of her head. Then she let her go and took a step back. “You’re a fucking idiot,” she said for a third time, “but hell, if you aren’t stupidly perfect. _Stupid_. But pretty perfect.”

“I’m not entirely sure how to take that,” Nicole grumbled, rubbing the back of her head as she bent down to pick up her hat.

“Take it as as close to approval as you’re ever going to get from me, Haught.”

“Approval for wha- oh.” Nicole flushed. “Wynonna, I-”

“Don’t finish that sentence, Nicole. Whatever you decide to do, talk it out with Waverly.” Wynonna grinned. “Or I’ll punch you again.”

Nicole moved her shoulder experimentally. “Noted.”

Movement in the corner of Wynonna’s eye caught her attention, and she turned towards Yancy Hall. “Did you see that?”

“See what?”

“It looked like somebody was in there.”

Nicole gave an exasperated sigh. “Figures. Probably some idiots going on adventures. I know of three particular students who did that fairly recently.”

“Dude, don’t mock us, you were there too.” Wynonna squinted at the building. “Are you going to go in after them?”

“Eh. I’m not on duty.”

“You’re in uniform.”

“Oh. Uh. I, uh… sometimes wear this when I’m out playing that game at night, so that if anybody questions me I can claim I’m patrolling.”

Wynonna rolled her eyes. “You are such a _nerd_. Come on, let’s go make sure nobody’s doing something stupid.”

Nicole fidgeted with her collar. “We don’t… _have_ to.”

“You’re scared,” Wynonna realized.

“You’re not?”

“Shit, I’m terrified. I thought not talking about the ghosts would help, but it doesn’t, at all.” Wynonna rolled up her sleeves and set her jaw. “But I’m not letting that stop me from the chance to beat up some freshmen.”

Nicole laughed. “Oh, alright. I guess that’s a convincing enough argument.”

“Good girl.”

 

+++

 

Yancy Hall seemed to be empty. They walked through the first floor, led by the light of Nicole’s flashlight.

“Are you sure you saw something, Wy?” Nicole asked in a hushed voice.

“I’m never really sure about anything.”

“Typical.”

They stopped in their tracks when Nicole’s flashlight beam landed on a door marked with the same blood red marking that they had seen on a completely different floor on their first venture into the building.

“Oh, good. We’re going to die,” Nicole said dryly.

“Shut up, Nicole.” Wynonna took a step towards the door. “At this rate, what’s the harm?” She took in a deep breath and pushed it open.

The room was entirely painted, the same red color as the symbol on the door.

“Okay, seriously, what the _hell_ is going on in this building?” Wynonna took a step through the doorway, squinting in the dim light to look around the room.

“Hell might be the right answer,” Nicole muttered, stepping in to follow her.

At the exact moment they both crossed the threshold, the floor collapsed beneath them, sending them plummeting into darkness.


	8. Chapter 8

**SEPTEMBER 24**

 

Waverly’s cellphone woke her up at three in the morning.

“Hello?” she mumbled, hoping that she didn’t wake Chrissy.

“Is this Waverly Earp?”

“Mm. If Wynonna got arrested again, I’m not bailing her out until there’s daylight.”

The voice on the other end of the line kept the serious tone. “Miss, your sister is in the hospital.”

“ _What?_ ” Waverly flinched as her yelp startled Chrissy awake. “What do you mean?”

“She and a friend were involved in an… incident.”

 _A friend_. For a split second, Waverly wondered if her sister and her crush had literally put each other in the hospital, but that was absurd. She heard the caller give her more information as to which hospital Wynonna was at, and she quickly got out of bed.

“What’s going on?” Chrissy asked sleepily.

“Wynonna’s in the hospital.”

“What?” Chrissy was fully awake in an instant, sitting up with wide eyes. “Why? How?”

“I don’t know. I’m going over there now.”

“Do you need me to go with you?”

Waverly hesitated, but she shook her head. “I’ll be okay. Can you call Doc and Xavier? Let them know?”

“Of course.”

 

+++

 

“What the hell were you thinking?”

Wynonna flinched away from Waverly, rubbing the side of her head. “Jeez, Waves, I have a concussion and a broken arm. I don’t really need you screaming at me too.”

“The cop outside filled me in on what happened.” Wavery folded her arms across her chest. “You and Nicole went into the Yancy building? Are you joking? They’re saying that the floor collapsed because of the construction, but I think we both know that’s bullshit. You were looking for more goddamn _ghosts_ , weren’t you?”

“Waves, come on. Give me a break. I don’t know why that floor fell apart. It just did. We’re fine. Sort of. They’re even releasing us soon.”

Waverly scoffed, but pulled her into a tight hug. “Next time I get a call at three in the morning that says you’re in the hospital, I’m leaving your ass here.”

Wynonna laughed. “Good. I’d deserve it.

There was a soft knock on the door, and they glanced up to see Xavier standing there, worry in his eyes.

“Sorry to interrupt. I can wait outside if you want.”

“No, it’s fine, Xavier. I, uh…” Waverly fidgeted with her shirt. “I’ll go check on Nicole.”

 

+++

 

The chief of campus police, Chrissy’s father Randy Nedley, was talking to Nicole when Waverly crept into the door. He had a stern look on his face, but his eyes betrayed his relief.

“You know, Haught, if you weren’t such a good cop, I’d suspend you to hell and back.”

“Yes, sir.”

“What the hell were you _thinking_? That building is off-limits, and you weren’t even on duty tonight.”

Nicole shrugged. “Sometimes when I decide to wander around at night, just for some air, I decide to make it a patrol. It’s better to do that than to be doing nothing, isn’t it?”

“Maybe, but you should at least call it in. You’re lucky you both had cellphones and you were conscious enough to make a call, or you would probably still be in that basement a week from now.” Nedley pointed a finger directly in Nicole’s face. “And what were you even _doing_ in there?”

“Wynonna thought she saw somebody go in the building,” Nicole answered softly. “We figured it would be best to make sure nobody had, because, well… it’s off-limits.”

Nedley gave a quiet laugh. “Sadly, I’d probably do the same thing. But next time? _Call it in_. Understand?”

“Yes, sir.”

“You aren’t allowed to work for the next week, and after that, you’re doing nothing but car patrols for a week. This isn’t a punishment, this is me making sure that you don’t do anything to damage those cracked ribs you gave yourself.”

“Yes, sir.”

He paused for a long moment, half-glaring at her. “Get some rest, Haught.” He turned on his heel and walked out of the room, nodding once at Waverly on his way.

Nicole noticed Waverly and reddened slightly. “Hey.”

“Really? That’s all you’re going to say? You avoid me for days and all you can think to say is _hey_?”

“I’m not really very good at this,” Nicole admitted.

Waverly gave a heavy sigh. “Yeah, well, neither am I.” She walked into the room, trying not to get distracted by Nicole’s open uniform shirt and the slightly-too-low light blue tank top that was visible under it. “Are you okay?”

“Mostly. Few bruised and cracked ribs. Gashed my hand so badly I needed stitches.” Nicole shrugged. “We were very, _very_ lucky. Y’know, for two people who almost got murdered by ghosts.”

Wavery didn’t laugh. “I’m not going to hit either of you because you’re injured. But I’m so very, very tempted. Wynonna didn’t answer me, so I’m going to ask you… What were you thinking?”

“It’s like I told Nedley. We thought someone was inside.”

“Great, but you know that building is haunted.”

“No, I know that the _theatre_ is haunted. It’s different.”

Waverly put her hands on her hips. “You’re joking, right?”

Nicole paused. “I don’t know what you want me to say, Waverly.”

“I don’t, either.” Waverly sighed and turned away. “I’m glad you’re okay.”

“Thanks,” Nicole said in a whisper as Waverly left.

 

+++

 

Waverly sat down next to Doc in the hallway. “You came with Xavier?”

“Why, of course.” He gave her a sideways glance. “Are you alright?”

“They’re both idiots.”

Doc laughed. “Well, I’m not certain that’s entirely fair. They’re just always tryin’ to do the right thing, whether it’s the most sensible thing for the time or not.”

“Have you seen Wynonna yet?”

“Nah. Xavier’s with her. I figure I’d give them the moment before I bust in and disturb them.” Doc winked at her. “Because, ya know, that’s a lot more fun.”

“Disturb them?”

Doc stared at her for a long moment. “Tell me you’re joking, Waverly.”

“What do you mean?”

“Wynonna and Xavier have been a… shall we say, _thing_ for over a month now.”

“Oh, Christ. Of course they have been.”

He laughed at her and took her hat off. “You’re a mess, Waverly. You have no idea what’s going on around you, do you?”

Waverly was silent. “Doc… do you ever feel like you know what you want but not whether you want to take it?”

Doc shrugged. “That’s pretty much the only way I know that I actually want something. If it scares the hell out of me, if it worries me, if it’s all I can ever think about even when I’m trying not to…” He gave her a grin. “That’s how I know it’s truly worth my time.” He put his hat back on his head and walked towards Wynonna’s room.

Waverly watched him leave. Then, she stood up, and walked back to the room where Nicole was.

 

+++

 

The redhead was attempting to button her shirt one-handed, trying not to mess up the bandages on her left hand. She managed to get one done, but her expression quickly got frustrated as she struggled to get a second one.

Waverly chuckled softly. “Stop, just stop. Let me do it.” She walked over and started buttoning Nicole’s uniform. “I’m sorry,” she murmured.

“What for?”

“Being so goddamn confusing.”

Nicole shrugged. “I’m the asshole who avoided you for days. Which one of us is really to blame for all of this?”

“Both of us, I guess.” Waverly buttoned the top button of Nicole’s shirt and laughed. “You know, I’m pretty sure your uniform hasn’t been this put together in the entire time you’ve owned it.”

“Gross. Too professional.”

“Looks good, though.” Waverly played with Nicole’s collar for a long, silent moment. “We need to talk. About everything.”

“Okay-”

“Not when you’re injured and almost got murdered by ghosts and on like a fistful of pain meds.” Waverly pulled Nicole forward by the collar of her shirt and kissed her softly on the mouth. Lingering only millimeters away from her, she murmured, “But we need to talk.” She kissed her again, just a bit harder, gave her a small smile, and went back out into the hallway.

 

+++

 

**OCTOBER 9**

 

Nicole pulled her campus police car onto the sidewalk, driving it slowly next to Waverly behind the English building. She rolled down her window and said, “You know, when you said we had to talk, I didn’t really think you’d mean that we _wouldn’t_ talk for two weeks.”

“I had to get my thoughts together,” Waverly said defensively.

“You’ve kissed me three times at this point, Wave. If you think _my_ thoughts are together, you really don’t know me very well at all.”

Waverly laughed. “You’re ridiculous.”

“Two weeks!”

“Oh, alright. I keep kissing you impulsively with no planning whatsoever, and I’m a _planner_ , Nicole. This is bullshit. I don’t do things impulsively. So we need to talk, but I was trying to plan out what I’m going to say.”

“How’s that working out for you?”

She shrugged. “Well, it’s been two weeks, so…”

Nicole grinned widely.

“No, don’t do that.”

“Don’t… smile?”

“Don’t do that stupid dimpled grin that should be classified as a fucking _weapon_. It’s too attractive to be legal.”

Nicole continued to grin at her. “I dunno, Waverly, I think you’re talking pretty well.”

“You’re an asshole.”

“I’m just a little confused, y’know? I don’t get what it is that you want. Because you keep approaching me first, and then I try to avoid you to give you space, and then I find you, and then I’m an asshole.”

Waverly stopped walking. “You want to know what it is that I want, Nicole?”

“Kinda, yeah.”

She looked around, noticing that they had ended up in a part of campus that was practically deserted. “Get out of the car.”

Utterly baffled, Nicole put her car in park and stepped out. Waverly was amused to see that the woman legitimately had no idea what was going on.

“You haven’t got a clue, do you?”

“Where you’re concerned? Not exactly.”

“Do you want to know what I want, Nicole?”

Nicole blinked. “I… Yeah, isn’t that what-”

Waverly put her hands on Nicole’s shoulders, pushed her up against her own car, and kissed her hard on the mouth.


	9. Chapter 9

**OCTOBER 9**

When Waverly finally released Nicole, she almost laughed at the dazed look on the other woman’s face. “I’m sorry,” she said, practically giggling. “I’m just… I really am not good at this at all. I’m used to idiot boys asking me out by asking me if I want to make out behind the café.”

Nicole hesitated, swallowing as she tried to regain her sense. “Do you wanna make out behind the café?”

Waverly laughed and fixed Nicole’s hat, which had been knocked askew. “With you? Absolutely. But we should probably stop randomly making out everywhere.” She kissed Nicole again, slowly. “Probably.”

“We should _probably_ stop making out constantly,” Nicole said. She yanked Waverly forward and swapped positions with her, pinning her against the car. As she smirked and turned her hat backwards, she said, “But we don’t _have_ to.”

A sudden memory flashed inexplicably through Waverly’s mind, of Nicole flawlessly keeping up with Wynonna’s sarcasm and harassing her back to a point that Wynonna could only tell her to shut up.

In that moment, she realized that she was probably screwed.

Also in that moment, she realized that she really, _really_ didn’t care.

“Oh, hell, you’re going to be trouble, aren’t you?” Waverly muttered, biting her lip as she looked up at Nicole.

“Absolutely. But you started it, Waverly Earp.” Grinning the grin that pissed her off so much, Nicole lifted Waverly’s chin carefully. “Don’t worry, though. I’ll be glad to finish it.”

Waverly gave a somewhat embarrassed laugh. “You’re such an asshol-”

Nicole cut her off by kissing her, and Waverly completely forgot what she was trying to say.

 

+++

 

**OCTOBER 13**

 

Wynonna walked uninvited into Xavier’s dorm room and laid down on his bed. “Broken arms suck.”

Xavier, sitting at his desk, didn’t look up from his computer. “You should have considered that before you went into an unsafe area.”

“First of all, fuck you.”

“You do.”

Wynonna threw a pillow at him. “Second of all, I understand that, but they won’t take this thing off until _November 7 th_. November 7th! Midterms are next week and I have to suffer through them _while in a fricking cast_.”

“No sympathy.”

“You’re the _worst_ , Xavier.” Wynonna sighed dramatically, kicking his chair lightly. “It’s been a month. When are we going to talk about it?”

Xavier frowned at her. “Talk about what?”

“Well… the ghost thing that we’ve all been avoiding so damn much. We don’t even know for sure that it’ll even _happen_ again. As terrifying as the situation was for me and Nicole, I really do think we need to go back there and make sure that it wasn’t just a… a fluke.”

“I’m not sure hauntings can necessarily be _flukes_ , but otherwise I see your point.” Xavier leaned back in his chair and sighed. “After midterms. Over fall break. I don’t think any of us are planning to go home, so while most of campus is cleared out, why don’t we use the time to do some investigating? Or, possibly, dying, but hopefully the ghosts got the murder impulses out of their systems by trying to bury you and Nicole in a basement.”

“Comforting. But I think it’ll work for me.”

“Good. Are you going to fail the Psych midterm as badly as I am?”

He scoffed. “Never, Earp.”

“What if I seduce you while you try to study?”

“You have a broken arm, and you suck at seduction.”

“Fuck you, Dolls.”

Xavier smirked. “See what I mean?”

 

+++

 

“I always forget that Xavier is my RA. And then I forget Wynonna is dating him… sleeping with him… whatever. And it’s a pain in the ass,” Waverly grumbled as she quickly dragged Nicole past Xavier’s room.

“If Wynonna’s in there, I don’t think he’s going to notice us, Waves,” Nicole said.

“Don’t jinx it.” Waverly pulled Nicole into her room and shut the door. “Chrissy’s gone home for the weekend, so we don’t need to worry about her wandering in while we talk.”

“Okay.” Nicole sat down backwards on Waverly’s desk chair. “What is it that we’re talking about?”

Waverly just stared at her for a moment before reaching over and removing her GRU Phantoms cap. “Sorry. The hat’s starting to become a thing, and I can’t hold a conversation with you when you’re wearing one.”

Nicole laughed. “Well, okay. If it bothers you.”

“It doesn’t, trust me, but there’s something I need to ask you about, and I can’t let myself get interrupted by how badly I want to kiss you.”

“I mean-”

Waverly put her hand over Nicole’s mouth. “No.”

“Wasn’t gonna say anythin’,” Nicole mumbled against Waverly’s hand.

“Sure you weren’t.” Waverly sat down on her bed, fidgeting with Nicole’s hat. “Why do you wear this, anyway? Our basketball team is… let’s use the word ‘bad’ and leave it at that. The only team more embarrassing is the hockey team that hasn’t won a game in two years.”

Nicole shrugged. “It’s not so much our team as it is the sport. I played basketball in high school.”

“Didn’t feel like continuing in college?”

“I wanted to spend my time working on something that would actually benefit my future, not a game that was never going to take me anywhere.”

“Realistic.” Waverly was silent for a long moment. “Can I ask… those first days, after I kissed you the first time… why did you avoid me?”

Nicole gave a soft laugh. “Do you want the truthful answer or one that will make me look less like an idiot?”

“Truthful.”

After hesitating, Nicole said, “In the span of barely an hour and a half, I learned that you were a year younger than I thought you were. I admitted out loud that I had a crush on you. Worse, I found out that apparently pretty much everybody already knew that I had that crush. And then you come outside and you kiss me so quick I almost didn’t realize it happened, and you run away.” Her voice dropped a few volume levels. “We’re in college and it was your eighteenth birthday and without any warning or lead up you kissed me.”

Waverly let out a long breath through gritted teeth. “You thought it was a whim. Or, worse, an experiment.”

“Combine that with how badly I did _not_ want to look like somebody who had been hanging around you waiting for you to turn eighteen so that we could, I don’t know, _whatever_ , and I just…” Nicole shrugged again. “I panicked. And I’m sorry for being such an asshole about it.”

“No.” Waverly stood and walked over to her, taking her face in her hands. “We were _both_ fools. It’s not your fault, at least not entirely.”

“Can I ask you something?”

“Of course.”

“Why did you run away?”

Waverly gently stroked her fingers through Nicole’s hair. “Honestly, I didn’t mean to kiss you. I hadn’t figured out yet that what I was feeling for you was more than friendship. More than anything. I didn’t realize what was going on. But when you were sitting on that porch, flirting just a little bit, and then I put your hat back on and even though a part of me _knew_ what would happen if I put it backwards… You were right there, accessible, looking more attractive than anyone I’d ever seen in my life, and I couldn’t help myself. But as soon as I did it, I remembered that I didn’t even really know what I was doing, how I felt. And I…” She laughed. “I panicked.”

“We should really stop doing that.”

“Definitely.” Waverly put Nicole hat back on her head, brim facing away from her. “And now I’m going to make out with you.”

Nicole grinned. “Are you going to run away this time, Waverly Earp?”

Waverly looped her arms around Nicole’s neck and rested her forehead against hers. “I don’t plan on doing that again any time soon.”


	10. Chapter 10

**OCTOBER 19**

The Friday after midterms was the start of fall break, a four-day weekend meant to give students time to go home and decompress after studying. Almost the entire campus left, but many students stuck around. This fall break, the entire group of accused ghost-hunters decided to stay.

Accused ghost-hunters who knew that _there really were ghosts_.

“We need a code name,” Waverly said, sitting down at the table in the study room they had commandeered on the top floor of the library. “Something cool and mysterious but nothing that screams ‘those losers that know evil spirits are haunting this campus’, y’know?”

“No,” Xavier said.

“Terrible idea,” Nicole added.

Wynonna threw a pen at Nicole. “Don’t act like you’re not just as much of a nerd as my little sister, Haught. And you, Xavier, are just no fun at all.”

“”Black Badge Division.”

Everyone looked at Doc. Waverly raised an eyebrow. “What?”

He shrugged. “It’s mysterious enough but vague enough, and it still sounds pretty cool.”

“How did you even come up with that that fast?” Waverly asked.

“Theatre Major,” Wynonna, Xavier, and Nicole all said at the exact same time.

“Oh. Right. I thought you sucked at improv, though.”

“Give me some degree of credit,” Doc protested.

“Nah. I like your idea, though. We should go with it.”

“Agreed. And I’m declaring it so.” Wynonna slammed her hand down on the table, then winced and looked out the window of the study room to make sure the sound hadn’t made it out to disturb anyone in the vicinity. “Anyway,” she said in a softer voice. “We’re going to go into Remington Hall again, right?”

“Absolutely. We need to make sure that what happened in that basement wasn’t a one-off incident.” Xavier leaned back in his chair. “Staying there again, maybe even more than once, is the only way to know.”

“Lovely,” Nicole muttered.

Under the table, Waverly interlocked her fingers with Nicole’s comfortingly.

“We absolutely cannot do it tonight,” Doc said. “The theatre is being utilized for a high school’s recital. But it is free the whole rest of the weekend.”

“Saturday night, then.” Xavier’s voice was serious and full of determination.

“Great. Before we do that, I, uh, sort of looked into that murder.” Waverly reached into her backpack and pulled out a three-ring binder that was about two inches thick.

“Jesus Christ, Wave,” Nicole sighed.

“Oh, hush.” Waverly opened the binder to a middle section. “Most of this is info on hauntings, ghosts in general, the history of each building on campus, research into what exactly that symbol was that you guys found in Yancy, that sort of thing. But this bit right here is what I’m talking about. The girl who was killed? It’s not just that her murder was never solved. There weren’t even any _suspects_. Campus was all but deserted, two police officers who passed the building earlier in the night heard her music coming from the building but didn’t see a soul around, there was no blood leading away from the body but also no evidence of anyone cleaning anything up, she had no known enemies on campus, and despite searching every single spot on this campus that could reasonably hide it the knife was never found. The cops had _nothing_. Aside from the cops and the person who found her, they didn’t even have anyone to _interview_. She lived alone off-campus and she was a workaholic transfer student who basically had no friends.”

“Aside from the transfer student part, she sounds like Nicole,” Wynonna joked.

“Bite me, Earp.”

“That’s not for me to do,” Wynonna snapped back, glancing at Waverly with pure mischief in her eyes.

Nicole and Waverly both went bright red, but the boys either didn’t notice or elected not to react.

“So not only was there a murder in Remington Hall, it was a creepy murder. This is information that probably doesn’t help us other than letting us know that we’re definitely going to end up on the front page of the school newspaper in some sort of memorial.”

“Such pessimistic behavior, Xavier,” Doc said with a snort.

“I watch movies.”

“Boring ones.”

“Look, _John Henry_ , if you-”

“ _His name is John Henry?_ ” Wynonna exclaimed gleefully.

“Fuck you, Dolls.”

“Should we leave before this gets ugly?” Waverly asked Nicole in a whisper.

“I dunno, I was going to suggest placing bets.”

Waverly gave her a look.

“Yeah, sure, let’s go.”

 

+++

 

“Are you okay? You don’t seem very comfortable with the idea of going back to that theatre.” Waverly sat down on Nicole’s couch and invited Calamity up. The cat immediately curled up in her lap and started purring as she pet it.

“You weren’t in that room, Waverly. It felt… I can’t even describe it. It just felt _cold_. Add in what happened in Yancy Hall…” Nicole sat next to her, sighing heavily. “I don’t know how Wynonna and I didn’t die. And I’m not exactly looking forward to giving it another go. But I’m certainly _going_ , because all of you are. You’re my friends.”

“I _think_ you and I are more than friends, Nicole.”

She laughed. “You know what I mean.”

“I do.” Waverly kissed Nicole on the cheek. “Speaking of, I’m going to shoot Wynonna.”

“Oh, God, yeah, what the hell was that about? Does she know, or-”

“If she knows, it’s certainly not because I told her.” Waverly paused, rubbing the cat’s ears gently. “Which means that she doesn’t know, because my sister is oblivious. So that comment was either her being weird or her trying to subtly push us together using her definition of subtle.”

“Either way it was weird.”

“Agreed. It doesn’t matter. We’ll tell them, soon. I just honestly have started to like the sneaking.” The cat jumped off of Waverly’s lap and ran into the kitchen. “Where’s she going?”

“Eh, she usually takes a nap for a few hours around this time so that she can be up all night guarding the house. I’m not sure what she’s guarding it from, but supposedly cats cat see ghosts so I’m okay with it.” Nicole gestured to Waverly’s backpack. “Your paranormal binder is a little, uh, scary there, Waves.”

“I’m a double major in History and English with a minor in Latin. Do you _really_ think I’m not the kind of nerd that would make a binder like that?”

“Oh, I totally believe it, it’s just scary.”

“Can you live with that?”

“Absolutely. You’re just going to have to accept the fact that you’re a nerd.”

Waverly jabbed a finger into Nicole’s shoulder. “You took over _eight Gyms_ on campus, but _I’m_ the nerd? Seriously? That’s what you’re going with?”

“Yes,” Nicole deadpanned.

“Unbelievable. I bet you were an asshole jock in high school, too.”

“Excuse me, I was a _nice_ jock in high school.”

“I don’t believe you.”

Nicole laughed. “What the hell were _you_ then?”

“I’m not answering that question.”

“Oh, come on-”

The conversation continued for hours, late into the night, before trailing off.

It wasn’t that they had run out of things to talk about.

It was that they had run out of excuses to keep talking.

Waverly gently pulled Nicole forward until she was practically on top of her and kissed her softly.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Nicole asked in a whisper, ignoring Waverly’s wandering hands.

The question lingered in the air for a moment. Waverly wasn’t sure anyone had ever asked her it before. She struggled with a response before stupidly, in her fluster, deciding on what she thought was the witty response.

“Depends, is ‘this’ you, because if so yes.”

Nicole didn’t respond, the concerned look in her eyes staying put.

“Nicole,” Waverly murmured, taking her face in her hands. “I’m sure.”

Without a word, a smile flickered across Nicole’s lips, and she leaned down to kiss her.

 

+++

 

**OCTOBER 20**

 

Waverly’s ringtone blasted her awake at a little past 2:30 in the morning. She scrambled to grab it off of Nicole’s nightstand, not even looking at the caller I.D. before answering it in a hushed voice.

“If Wynonna put herself in the hospital again, I’m _not coming to get her_.”

“Waverly, where are you? Are you okay?” Chrissy’s voice was anxious. “You always text if you’re going to be out past two.”

She had, quite honestly, forgotten that her roommate hadn’t gone home for break. “Sorry, yeah, I’m fine,” Waverly whispered. “I…” She glanced down at the woman asleep next to her. “I’m with Nicole.”

A lengthy silence answered her, and she flinched. She was about to try to defend herself when a soft laugh came through the speaker.

“About damn time.”

Waverly let out a breath she hadn’t realized she was holding. “You knew?”

“Honey, I’ve seen the way you two idiots look at each other. Of course I knew.” Chrissy gave another gentle laugh and said, “Go back to your girl, Waverly Earp. Good night.”

“Good night.”

For a long moment, Waverly just stared at her phone. As she moved to set it back on the nightstand, Nicole stirred.

“Whowa’that?” she mumbled, blinking at her in confusion.

“Nobody,” Waverly murmured. “It wasn’t anything to worry about.” She pressed a kiss to Nicole’s forehead. “Go back to sleep.”

“…k.”

Nicole was already out again by the time Waverly laid back down. In only a few moments, she joined her.

 

+++

 

The Black Badge Division elected to stay in the hallway just outside of the prop room Saturday night. As Wynonna battled the boys to claim ownership over the pretzels, Waverly and Nicole sat side by side against the opposite wall, hands linked between them as they whispered gently to each other. After about fifteen minutes of this, Wynonna elbowed Doc and Xavier and gestured at the other two women.

“So, uh, the awkwardness between you two has been resolved?” she asked.

Nicole just rolled her eyes and took a sip of her bottle of soda.

Waverly, however, said, “Fine, Wynonna, okay. Yes, I’m sleeping with Nicole.”

Nicole choked on her soda so badly that for several seconds she legitimately couldn’t breathe, doubled over in pain as Waverly patted her on the back.

“Shake it off, Haught,” Waverly muttered.

“ _You didn’t have to say it like that, Waverly, we only just-_ ” Nicole broke off, her face flushed bright red as she shot a terrified glance at Wynonna and then stared at the floor.

“Sorry,” Waverly said with a weak grin. “I told you I’m not good at this.”

“Jesus Christ,” Nicole whispered.

“We are going to have a discussion about this,” Wynonna said slowly, “after we deal with the fact that the prop room just opened by itself.”

They all turned to look and saw that the doors were slowly creaking open on their own power. Without any warning, several items flew out of the room, crashing into the wall near where Wynonna, Xavier, and Doc were sitting. As they scrambled to get out of the way, piano music started blaring through the hall.

“Is it too late to wish that this was a sick prank?” Wynonna asked in a shout over the noise.

“Extremely!” Waverly shouted back.

“That’s what I thought!”

Every light, including the emergency lights, went out, and the fire alarm started screeching over the piano music.

“We’re going to die,” Nicole muttered. “Though at least I’ll die before Wynonna can kill me.”

Waverly patted her on the cheek. “That’s looking on the bright side.”

A ceiling tile fell almost on top of Xavier.

“Oh, fuck this,” he yelled. “Everybody _out_!”

They ran for the fire exit, but it didn’t open. Every door in the basement, including the one they had used to enter, was inexplicably locked.

“What was it that you said about dying, Nic?” Waverly asked, quietly enough that she could barely be heard over all of the noise.

“That it’s totally going to happen?” She shrugged. “Probably like right now.”

A fake axe shot out of the prop room, spun around the corner, and embedded itself in the wall next to Waverly’s head.

“I’m thinking you’re right about that.”


	11. Chapter 11

**OCTOBER 20**

 

Xavier yanked the axe out of the wall as another ceiling tile fell, barely missing Wynonna’s injured arm. “Doc, what’s this thing made out of?”

“Hard rubber with a plastic handle,” Doc replied.

“Then how did it go through _concrete_?”

Doc looked at him. “Because we’ve awoken the goddamn _devil_?”

“Do you think there’s a Gengar in here right now?” Nicole muttered.

“Now isn’t the time to check, Nicky.” Waverly ducked as a cymbal tried to play itself against her face. “Though trust me, I would really like to check. That would be such a cool story.”

“And a shitty way to die, _nerds_ , so don’t even _touch_ your phones right now!” Wynonna grabbed Nicole by the collar and pulled her out of the way of a large wooden statue.

Xavier bashed his shoulder against the door and managed to force it open. “Thank hell.” A book slammed into his back. “ _Ow!_ Go, just go, out of the building!”

 

+++

 

Outside, the whole group just laid down on the grass, gasping for breath.

“Jesus Christ,” Wynonna breathed. “Shit. Whatever that thing is really, _really_ hates us. Like, _us_ , specifically. Fuck.”

“Whatever books you guys use in your plays are _heavy_ , Doc,” Xavier said, rubbing the spot on his back where the object had hit him.

“Are you okay? Let me look at it.” Wynona pushed Xavier onto his side and pulled up the back of his shirt. “Wow, yeah, that’s gonna bruise nicely.”

“Thanks for the sympathy.”

“I’m gonna get fired,” Nicole murmured. “Super fired. _Fired, then rehired just so they can fire me again._ ”

Waverly vaguely patted her shoulder. “You’ll be okay.”

“No, I’m going to get fired, too,” Xavier said. “If we don’t all get expelled. They’ll never believe we didn’t do all of that damage. Everyone’s going to think we did it.”

Waverly looked over at him. “Why would we?”

“Doesn’t matter. The minute we call this in, we’re all screwed.”

Doc sat up and adjusted his shirt, clearly thinking. “Well, and this is just a suggestion, but… perhaps we shouldn’t make that call?”

“You think we should just leave it like that for somebody to find tomorrow?” Nicole asked incredulously.

“Do you want to lose your job and your ability to get a degree from this school over a sense of propriety, Nicole?”

“… No.”

“Well, then I reckon none of us have a choice, do we?”

“I have a record,” Wynonna whispered. “I’ve managed to straighten my life out, but if I show signs of falling into those bad habits as an adult just like I did as a kid… my juvie record may be _sealed_ , but I don’t think it will matter in the long run.”

“Alright.” Waverly sat up, gently pulling on Nicole’s sleeve to get her up as well. “I’m game with the ‘run like hell and pretend it didn’t happen’ plan.”

“Except we aren’t going to pretend it didn’t happen, at least not amongst ourselves,” Xavier insisted. “We know now. We know that it’s all true.”

“Wynonna and I already knew that, but thanks for joining the party,” Nicole said dryly.

“It’s not just Remington Hall, either,” Doc said. “Not if what happened to Nicole and Wynonna in Yancy is related.”

“Christ, how many buildings at this school are haunted?” Xavier muttered.

Wynonna scoffed as she stood up and glared at the theatre building. “At this rate I wouldn’t be shocked if it’s all of them.”

“Good bet.”

Wynonna walked over and held out a hand to help Nicole to her feet. Once she was up, Wynonna punched her in the shoulder.

“ _Ow_ , come on, Wy-”

Nicole was cut off when Wynonna pulled her into a tight one-armed hug. “If you hurt my sister, I’ll kill you. Or I’ll just let the ghosts have you. Either way.”

“I’m pretty sure Waverly would kill me first,” Nicole said, bewildered.

“This is a good point.” Wynonna released her and went over to help Xavier up.

Waverly, standing next to Nicole, chuckled. “You had to know what you were getting yourself into, Nicole.”

“Part of me did. Part of me was too distracted by you to think it through.”

“That’s the way it’s supposed to be,” Waverly said affectionately, reaching up to run her knuckles gently down Nicole’s cheek. “Come on. Let’s get out of here.”

 

+++

 

**OCTOBER 21**

 

“Supposedly they’re bringing in a laser tag setup on Monday as a sort of end-of-fall-break welcome back,” Wynonna said, putting her feet up on the table in the library study room. “We should go.”

“Are you sure you want to do that, Wynonna?” Nicole asked. “If you and I aren’t on the same team, you’ll die a slow, painful virtual death.”

“That sounds like a _challenge_ , Haught.”

“That’s a _promise_ , Earp.”

Waverly walked into the room, playing with her phone. “You know, Nicole, I just realized that I never customized your ringtone.”

Nicole put a hand over her heart. “I’ve been wounded, Waverly.” A gleeful smirk formed on her girlfriend’s face, and she paled. “Oh, no. What are you doing?”

_I’m too hot (hot damn)_

“No.”

“No?”

_It’s getting hot in-_

“No!”

_Feelin’ hot! Hot! Hot!_

“Oh, Jesus Christ.” Nicole got up from the table and put her hat on her head. “I have a shift starting soon. I’m leaving before this gets any worse.”

Once she was gone, a grinning Wynonna leaned forward towards Waverly. “Spill.”

“Spill what?” Waverly asked innocently.

“I know damn well that you picked Nicole’s ringtone already. If not the moment you became friends, then _absolutely_ the moment you two started making out regularly.”

Waverly grinned and hit her phone screen.

_Bad boys, bad boys. What’cha gonna do? What’cha gonna do when they come for you?_

“Isn’t that the theme song to _Cops_?”

“Mhm.”

“That’s terrible. I love it.”

Xavier and Doc burst into the room, closely followed by Nicole, who they had apparently stopped before she could leave. “You aren’t going to believe this,” Doc said. He seemed out of breath, as if he had been sprinting.

“You boys stopped denying your feelings for each other and Xavier is going to break up with me?”

Doc stared at Wynonna for a moment. “No.” He put his hands on the table and leaned forward. “The basement of the theatre building is clear.”

“Clear how?”

“It’s like nothing happened to it,” Xavier sat down next to Wynonna. “The ceiling is in one piece. The wall isn’t damaged. The props are all where they belong.”

“At least the ghosts clean up after themselves,” Wynonna muttered. She tapped her fingers against the table. “Screw this. Screw it. For the rest of the semester, we’re looking into ways to handle ghosts. We’re looking into ways to _get rid of_ ghosts. And Waverly, that binder? Make it bigger. See if you can figure out what the hell is wrong with this campus, and if any other buildings are likely hotspots.”

“What then?” Doc asked.

Xavier was smiling. “I think I have an idea. Then we spend next semester clearing this campus out, right?”

“Damn straight.”

“Might I ask a question?”

Everyone looked at Doc.

“Why precisely are we bothering? These spirits don’t seem to be attacking anybody but us, so why not let it alone?”

“Two reasons,” Wynonna said. “First of all, Nicole still needs to stay here for another full year and Waverly still needs to stay here for _three_ years, and I’m not leaving them alone on a campus that actively wants them dead. Second of all, honestly, I have nothing more exciting to do in my last year of college, so why the hell not.”

“I’m all for making this school safer and using the opportunity to do _really cool things_ ,” Waverly agreed.

“Gryffindors,” Nicole muttered.

“Well, alright then,” Doc said. “If y’all are in, so am I.” He sat down at the table. “We need a Mystery Machine.”

Wynonna scoffed. “The ghosts are _real_ , Doc, not some bank robbers in Halloween masks.”

“Uh, actually, that argument depends on which incarnation of _Scooby-Doo_ we’re talking about,” Xavier said.

“Right. _Scooby-Doo on Zombie Island_ was the scariest movie of my childhood,” Nicole said.

“I’m surrounded by weirdos. Oh my God. This is unbelievable.”

“You’re not really one to talk, Wy.”

“Shut up, Waverly.”

 

+++

 

When Chrissy walked into her dorm room later that night, an episode of _A Haunting_ was halfway over on Waverly’s television. The owner of said television was passed out on her bed, lying practically on top of a sleeping Nicole Haught. Chrissy gave a small smile, shook her head, and turned the TV off.

Nicole woke up almost immediately at the lack of sound, but she didn’t move, carefully trying to keep Waverly from waking too. She rubbed at her eyes, clearly taking a few seconds to recognize Chrissy. “Sorry,” she mumbled. “I’ll go.”

“Don’t be stupid, Nicole. You’re just sleeping. You’re fine.” Chrissy sat down on her bed and started taking off her shoes. After a long moment, she said, “You know, my dad’s worried about you.”

“Why?”

“According to him, you’ve been distracted lately. Well, more than you sometimes can be. Plus that recklessness that almost got you and Wynonna both killed… He’s worried.”

“There’s no need for him to be,” Nicole said softly.

“I’m sure that’s true. But when Dad gains a soft spot for somebody, it’s very hard to make that go away. He’s decided that you’re one of his people, Nicole, and he’s going to worry about you whether he _needs_ to or not.” Chrissy’s gaze was gentle. “You’re sure you’re alright?”

“Yeah, Chrissy. I’m okay.” She absentmindedly ran a gentle hand through Waverly’s hair. “Better than I’ve been in a while.”

Chrissy smiled. “Good.”

“Though I’m sorry I worry him.”

“Just be careful, and he’ll be fine.” Chrissy hesitated. “ _All_ of you should be careful.”

She was still a bit groggy, but Nicole’s gaze was solid as she stared at Chrissy. “What do you mean?”

“I know you, Wave, Wynonna, Doc, and Xavier are up to something. It’s hard not to see that. I don’t know what it is. I’m not sure I want to. But if whatever it is caused you and Wynonna to almost die in Yancy Hall?” She gave a long pause. “Just… be careful. Promise?”

“I promise.”

“Good.” Chrissy stood, grabbed her pajamas and her bathroom caddy, and headed for the door. “Go back to sleep, Nicole. Whatever you’ve gotten yourself involved in, I have a feeling you’re going to need whatever rest you can get.”


	12. Chapter 12

**OCTOBER 31**

“I’m starting to think that as long as we don’t _actively antagonize_ the ghosts, they’ll leave us alone,” Wynonna said as she plopped down on Nicole’s couch, making the cat hiss irritably and hop over to the seat Waverly was sitting in.

Nicole groaned softly as she sat on the arm of Waverly’s chair. “Why would you say that? _On Halloween?_ It’s like _asking_ for something bad to happen. Have you never seen _Scream_?”

“Oh, I see, you mock me for the ghost chasing shows but you’re going to lecture me on horror movies now? You’ve never seen a good movie in your life.”

“I take great offense to that.”

Xavier and Doc walked into the room and took seats on opposite sides of Wynonna. “Did you hear about that freshman?” Xavier asked as he took a sip of his beer.

Waverly shook her head. “What freshman?”

“Oh, yeah, one of the freshmen went missing,” Nicole said. “Nedley wants us to keep an eye out for her. Nobody’s really sure what the deal is though; apparently she bombed all of her midterms and is at risk of failing out in her first semester. People are worrying that she either ditched school before they could kick her out, or she went off somewhere to hurt herself. We were looking for her all day before it got too dark to do anything else practical.”

“If y’all need any further assistance, let me know.” Doc toyed with his beer bottle. “I reckon I could gather the rest of the theatre majors to at least have a look around.”

“The other RAs and I are already on the lookout for anything suspicious,” Xavier said. “From what I understand, the concern is that all of her belongings were still in her room, so there’s no way to track her phone or anything else.”

“But doesn’t that…” Waverly trailed off, biting her lip.

Nicole’s brow furrowed. “What, babe?”

“Isn’t it possible that she didn’t leave on her own accord?”

The question hung in the air like a heavy summer humidity, weighing on all of them more than they had expected. After a very long pause, Nicole murmured, “Yes.”

 

+++

 

**NOVEMBER 10**

 

“Would either one of you care to explain to me why it’s one in the morning on a Saturday and I’m picking my sister and her girlfriend up from the campus lockup?” Wynonna asked, leaning against the bars in the campus police station.

Nicole was sitting on the cell bench as far away from Waverly as she could possibly get, her elbows on her knees and her face in her hands.

Waverly, flushed red, just shrugged. “They didn’t press charges. That’s all you need to know.”

“I’m presuming that only happened because Nic is a campus cop and Nedley’s favorite.”

“Possibly.”

“Just leave me here,” Nicole groaned into her hands. “Or kill me. Either would do.”

“Nothing is happening at all until one of you fesses up to why you got _arrested_ in the first place.”

“It wasn’t a big deal, Wynonna,” Waverly said, reddening further. “There was just a misunderstanding. They thought we had broken into the café, and then they had to bring us back here to process that we hadn’t, and then they couldn’t let us go unless they were releasing us to somebody. Some weird rule.”

Wynonna nodded slowly, a disbelieving look on her face. “Just a misunderstanding, huh? How did they come to think you had broken into the café?”

“Don’t ask,” Nicole grumbled.

“No reason,” Waverly said at the exact same time.

Almost immediately, Wynonna’s expression turned to one of almost sadistic glee. “Oh, holy shit. What were you guys up to in that café?”

“ _Nothing_. I went to pick Waverly up after her shift was over at eleven-thirty!”

“Uh-huh. And what happened after that? Am I going to _want_ to know, or is it a question a big sister shouldn’t be asking?”

“Jesus Christ,” Nicole whispered.

“Wynonna, just say what you want to say,” Waverly muttered exasperatedly.

“You were screwing in the café, weren’t you?”

Nicole groaned again and sunk her head further into her hands. Waverly, somehow, reddened even more. “Not… exactly,” she said. “I mean. We didn’t. We… we were just. I mean.”

“You were _almost_ screwing in the café, until the cops showed up because it was after hours and somebody thought you were breaking into the place.”

Waverly covered her eyes with her hand. Nicole just gave another, softer groan.

Wynonna started laughing loudly. “That lack of answer is really all of the confirmation I need. Come on, dumbasses. Let’s get out of here.”

 

+++

 

**DECEMBER 2**

The decision to avoid the haunted portions of campus as they gathered information proved more effective than any of them realized, and the Black Badge Division was able to get to finals week without any further incident.

Wynonna walked over to their claimed spot in the lunchroom. Nicole was lying on the couch, her head resting in Waverly’s lap and the brim of her hat pulled down over her eyes. The older Earp gave a soft smile as she sat down next to them and said, “Y’know, supposedly they’re bringing another thing of laser tag to campus to help us decompress during finals week. We should go.”

“Are you sure that’s a good idea? We need to study, and we still need more data on the history of some of the school buildings,” Waverly replied in a hushed voice.

“Live a little, Waves.”

“The last time we went laser tagging was fun,” Nicole mumbled.

Waverly gave a soft laugh, entwining her fingers with Nicole’s. “Last time we went laser tagging, I shoved you into a wall, made out with you, and then shot you in the chest while you were still too dazed to defend yourself.”

“Yeah, well, that was fun.”

With another laugh, Waverly tilted up Nicole’s hat for a brief moment so she could lean down to kiss her, then pushed the hat back down. “You’re such a nerd.”

“You’re one to talk. You took my Gym again,” Nicole grumbled.

“Fair point.”

“Speaking of nerds,” Wynonna said as the put her feet up on the table, “you guys get the classes you needed for next semester?”

“Please, I had all four years of class schedules planned out before I even got here.”

“Of course you did. Nicole?”

“Yep. Three three-hour courses. It’ll give me more freedom in terms of scheduling patrols.”

Waverly frowned. “You’re borderline ADHD and you scheduled yourself _three_ three-hour courses?”

Nicole was silent for a long moment. “Possibly not my _best_ plan, but I’ll cross that bridge when I come to it.”

“Oh, good God.”

“What are you guys doing over break?” Nicole asked.

“Sleeping,” Wynonna said.

“Researching more into hauntings,” Waverly said.

“I should have guessed both of those responses.”

Waverly gently tapped the brim of Nicole’s hat. “What are _you_ doing?”

“Uh, staying here, actually. I’ll go see my sister for Christmas but other than that I’m on campus. Job doesn’t stop just because the bulk of people aren’t here. There are still winter courses.”

Wynonna scoffed. “Have fun with that, dude. I for one will be glad to get the hell out of here.”

“It’s not going to be that bad, Wy,” Nicole said. “It’s just keeping a small handful of kids out of trouble.”

“Sure, Haught.” Wynonna patted the other woman’s leg. “I’m sure none of those kids is going to do _anything_ stupid while everybody else is gone.”

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 2**

Waverly, Wynonna, Doc, and Xavier walked up to Nicole’s front door, pulling jackets tighter around them.

“What exactly did Nedley say again, Waverly?” Xavier asked.

“Just that Nicole hasn’t shown up for work in a week. He told me that there’s only so much more he can do to keep from having to fire her, so he asked me to come over and make sure she’s okay. She called in and said she was fine, but… you know, it was just weird.” Waverly pulled a key out of her pocket and stuck it into the doorknob.

Wynonna snorted out a laugh. “You have a key to her place?”

“Shut up. It’s for emergencies or if I need to feed her cat.” Waverly pushed open the front door and took a step inside. “Nicole? Nicole! Are you home?”

They stepped further into the building, and a sharp breath from Doc immediately caught their attention. “Oh, Lord,” he whispered.

“What?” Wynonna followed his gaze, and her blood ran ice cold.

The symbol that had been inside Yancy Hall was painted in red on the wall of Nicole’s living room.

Panic quickly entered Waverly’s voice. “ _Nicole?!_ ”

She walked into the kitchen, and a knife buried itself in the wall next to her head. Before she could even register it, Nicole was in front of her and had a hand around her throat, pinning her next to the knife.

“Nicole, Jesus Christ, it’s _me_!”

Nicole’s eyes were glassy, and she looked as if she hadn’t slept in days. When she finally recognized Waverly, she immediately released her and stumbled backwards, collapsing to the floor with her back against the cabinets.

Waverly knelt in front of her, taking Nicole’s face in her hands. “Nic. Baby. Talk to me. What’s going on? What happened?”

“It won’t stop,” Nicole whispered in a raspy voice.

“What won’t?”

“The fucking _music_.”

“Music?”

Nicole looked at her, and the depths of fear in her eyes sent shivers through Waverly’s spine. “Can’t you hear it?” Waverly didn’t get a chance to answer before Nicole laughed dryly. “No, of course not. It’s just me.”

“Nicky, if there’s something wrong in your house, why didn’t you-"

“Leave?” Nicole laughed again. “I can’t. I can’t. I can’t.”

She just continued repeating the words over and over again in a whisper. Waverly stroked her cheek gently, then noticed dried blood that ran from under the sleeve of Nicole’s t-shirt.

Waverly swallowed, braced herself, and lifted the material.

The same symbol that had been on the doors in Yancy Hall was carved into Nicole’s shoulder.


	13. Chapter 13

**JANUARY 25**

“ _What are you wearing?_ ”

Nicole laughed loudly into her cellphone as she got out of her car and started walking up the sidewalk to her house. “You know damn well I’m in my uniform.”

“ _Yeah, but it’s more fun to hear you say it._ ”

“Alright, well, I’m home, dork, so I should hang up now. I have things to do.”

Waverly gave a soft chuckle. “ _Don’t want to talk to me all night?_ ”

“Trust me, I _want_ to, but I can’t. I have a paper to do before classes start.”

“ _Boring._ ”

“You love homework.”

“ _Okay, I am not_ that _much of a nerd, Nicole._ ”

“Yes you are.”

“ _… Maybe._ ” Waverly paused for a long moment. “ _Nicole?_ ”

She paused at her front door. “Yeah?”

“ _I love you._ ”

Nicole was pretty sure her heart stopped beating for a full five seconds. She swallowed and stammered, “I-I love you, too.”

Waverly’s voice held a twinge of embarrassment, and Nicole could practically hear her nervous smile. “ _Well. Good._ ”

They were silent for a while, Nicole standing in the icy wind holding the phone to her ear. Then, softly, she said, “I have to go, Wave.”

“ _Okay,_ ” Waverly said, almost sounding disappointed. “ _Goodnight, Nicole._ ”

“Goodnight, Waverly.”

Nicole stepped through her door and locked it behind her, taking her jacket off and tossing it onto a nearby chair. As she pulled off her uniform shirt, leaving only the tank top underneath, she walked into the living room.

And stopped in horror as she saw the symbol from Yancy Hall painted on her wall.

“What the fuc-”

Something hit her in the chest, throwing her back and slamming her into the wall behind her, opposite the symbol. She struggled to move and found that she couldn’t, and at that instant a searing pain flooded from her shoulder. Nicole looked down in a panic and saw the symbol slowly carving itself into her arm, without any logical source to blame.

The moment the symbol was complete, the force pinning Nicole back released, and she collapsed to the floor. She was back on her feet and headed for the door immediately, but when she opened it and tried to step outside, the fresh cut felt like it was on fire, and yet another invisible force yanked her back into the house. As she tumbled onto the floor, the door slowly closed and locked.

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 2**

 

Wynonna leaned against the doorway, watching as her little sister gently stroked her fingers through Nicole’s hair in an effort to calm her down. “What the hell happened here?” she asked in a whisper.

“Whatever it was wasn’t good.” Doc walked up to her, carrying Nicole’s cat, which was curled up in his arms and pressed against him. It was a sure sign that something _bad_ was going on in the house.

That cat _hated_ Doc.

“We need to get her out of here,” Xavier murmured from his spot next to Wynonna. “Until we figure out what’s going on, she can’t be in here. Obviously it’s having a very bad effect on her.”

Waverly pressed a soft kiss to Nicole’s forehead and stood, moving over to them. “She can’t leave,” she whispered.

“Why not?” Wynonna didn’t like the way Waverly looked about ready to burst into tears, but she needed to push for the answer.

“She, uh…” Waverly swallowed. “They carved the same symbol into her shoulder. It’s trapping her here.”

“Son of a _bitch_ ,” Wynonna spat. “What are we supposed to do about _that_?”

“I-I mean, I-I have an idea, but…” Waverly swallowed again, closing her eyes briefly. “I don’t know if I can… I don’t…”

“What is it, Waverly?” Xavier prompted.

Waverly’s voice was almost inaudible. “Break the symbol.”

The three stared at her. Wynonna was the first to break the silence. “You mean…”

“Yeah,” Waverly whispered.

Wynonna said nothing for another moment, then murmured, “Doc, take Waverly into the other room, would you?”

Waverly shook her head. “Wynonna, no, I should-”

“Hey.” Wynonna rested the palm of her hand against Waverly’s cheek. “She’s my friend. Okay? You don’t need to be here for this, and I don’t _want_ you here for this. Understand?”

Waverly glanced at Nicole, looking uncertain.

Wynonna pressed a quick kiss to Waverly’s forehead. “Go, baby girl. Go with Doc. C’mon. I’ll take care of her. I promise.”

Shaking slightly, Waverly shot a weak smile at her sister and said, “You’d better.” She followed Doc away from the kitchen.

“Are you sure you want to do this?” Xavier asked in a murmur. “I could-.”

“No.” Wynonna set her jaw. “She’s my friend,” she repeated quietly. “Now go get me a knife.”

As Xavier walked over to one of the drawers, Wynonna crouched down in front of Nicole.

“Haught, this is going to hurt, okay? But I promise you, it’s just to try to fix this. Alright?”

Nicole gave a dry laugh, and the exhaustion in her voice struck Wynonna deep in her chest. “It already hurts. How much worse could it get?”

Wynonna patted her on her good shoulder lightly. “That’s the spirit.” She lifted Nicole’s sleeve to get a look at the symbol, and her breath caught in her throat. “Jesus,” she whispered.

In that moment, she decided once and for all that they were done playing around. They were going to find out who was doing this- _what_ was doing this –to their school. No matter what it took.

She took a knife from Xavier and said, “Cover her mouth.”

“What?”

Wynonna swallowed, her voice low. “We can’t afford to have the neighbors call the police because they hear screaming.”

“Christ, Wynonna, you’re just going to cut a line through it. It won’t take that long.”

“ _Xavier!_ ” she said sharply. The concern in her eyes covered how badly she wanted to cry. “Please.”

He silently knelt on the other side of Nicole, and Wynonna rested the blade of the knife over the carved symbol. “Fuck this,” she whispered before pressing down.

Nicole’s muffled scream was still echoing in her ears five hours later when the group booked a room in a hotel two hours away from their campus.

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 3**

 

Xavier opened the sliding glass door and stepped out onto the balcony, where Wynonna was sitting on a lawn chair staring out at the field next to their hotel.

“How’s Nicole?” she asked in a quiet voice.

“Still asleep. Waverly’s watching her.”

Wynonna made a quiet scoffing noise. “That’s, what, twelve hours now?”

Xavier sat in the chair next to hers. “We don’t know how long it’s been since she got any rest. She’ll be okay. But, if she doesn’t wake up soon…”

“We’ll need to take her to a hospital,” Wynonna finished.

“Yeah.”

“How exactly will we explain that? And how will we keep her from being held on a psych hold? She got attacked by _ghosts_ , Xavier. That doesn’t exactly sound sane.”

“Hopefully we won’t need to deal with that problem. Doc just replaced the bandages on her shoulder. It looked like it was already starting to heal now that she’s out of the house.”

Wynonna rubbed at her eyes and gave a heavy sigh. Xavier reached over and took her hand.

“You should get some rest too, Earp.”

“I can’t. I can still hear Nicole’s scream.”

“You probably saved her life, Wynonna.”

She gave a short laugh. “Doesn’t make it go away any faster.” She pulled away from him and rubbed her hands together uncomfortably. “I still feel like I have her blood on my hands. I’ve washed them about fifty times at this point. I can still feel it.”

“It’ll pass,” Xavier said softly. “It will.”

“I made a decision, the moment that I saw that symbol carved into her arm.”

“What was it?”

“We’re stopping this. We’re hunting these ghosts down, and we’re finding a way to get rid of them. And we’re finding out who the hell is _helping_ them, and putting a stop to them, too.”

“Helping them?”

Wynonna gave him a sideways look. “Don’t tell me you think that mark painted on Nicole’s wall got there all by itself.”

“Oh, no, I completely agree with you. I just wasn’t sure if I was the only one thinking it.”

“You’re not.”

“And you’re not the only one who thinks that it’s about time we shut this down, one way or another.”

Wynonna took a sip from a bottle of whiskey. “We might blow our chances of graduating this semester if we spend our time working on this.”

Xavier was quiet for a long moment. “They attacked Nicole. Intentionally. They made this _personal_. I can live with having to stay here for an extra semester if it means I can get back at them for that.”

Wynonna handed the whiskey to him to share. “Then it looks like the Black Badge Division is going to be getting busy this semester.” She winked at him. “And I don’t just mean what you and I will be doing.”

Xavier laughed, shaking his head. “I knew you couldn’t be serious forever.”

She stood up to head inside, patting him on the shoulder. “If I don’t laugh, Xavier, I’ll go insane. And hell knows I’m not interested in going back to that again.”


	14. Chapter 14

**FEBRUARY 4**

 

Waverly swung her legs over the arm of the chair she was in and for the thousandth time thought about how uncomfortable the seats in the hotel room were. She stared at the ceiling, slowly spinning her phone in her hand and chewing on her lip.

“Is this a PokeStop?” Nicole’s voice asked groggily from the bed.

“ _Shit_ ,” Waverly whispered, almost falling out of her chair. She scrambled to her feet and walked over to Nicole, who was still lying down but was watching her softly. “That scared the hell out of me.”

“Sorry,” Nicole rasped. She rubbed at her eyes. “How long was I out?”

Waverly glanced at her watch. “Twenty hours.”

“That’s not good.”

“Not really, but at least you’re awake.” Waverly rested a hand on Nicole’s head, rubbing her thumb back and forth gently across her forehead. “How do you feel?”

“I’ve got a migraine that feels like how I image three simultaneous hangovers feel and my shoulder hurts like hell, but other than that I’m okay.”

“We’ll get some water and some aspirin in you. That should help it all start to go away.” Waverly bent down and pressed a soft kiss to Nicole’s forehead and gave a quiet laugh. “You know, if you didn’t want to deal with the fact that we both said ‘I love you’, you could’ve just said something.”

“I didn’t need to get attacked by ghosts? Damn. Should’ve thought of that.”

Waverly laughed again, her eyes watery. “You have no idea how glad I am to hear you be sarcastic.”

“Probably as glad as I am to hear your voice,” Nicole murmured.

She gave a tired laugh, and Waverly kissed her cheek. “Don’t do that to me again, Nicole,” she whispered. “I can’t lose you.”

“You won’t, Wave.”

“Promise?”

“Promise.”

Waverly rested her head against Nicole’s and closed her eyes. “Good.”

 

+++

 

Wynonna opened the door that separated the two hotel rooms they had rented and paused in the doorway. Nicole and Waverly were both asleep on the bed, Waverly as close as she could get without touching Nicole’s injured shoulder.

Xavier stopped behind her in the doorway. “What’s wrong?”

“Nothing,” Wynonna whispered. “I just… I’ve never seen her this happy with someone before.” She cleared her throat and stuck her hands in her pockets. “Of course, the fucking demon ghost bullshit almost ruined it all, but that doesn’t really surprise me. Fate has a habit of screwing me and Waverly both over.”

After a pause, Xavier ran his fingers down Wynonna’s spine. “They’ll be fine.”

“Only if we stop this.”

“And we will, Earp.”

“I’m not leaving them to deal with this alone,” she said softly. “Not after what happened to Nicole. Either we stop this, this semester, or…”

“Or what?”

“One of two options. We stay to help, or they leave with us. Education be damned. You can’t graduate college if you’re dead.”

He squeezed her shoulder briefly. “We’ll stop it, this semester.”

“We damn well better, because I refuse to not graduate on time.” Wynonna walked into the room and sat down on the foot of the bed, lightly tapping Nicole’s leg through the sheets. “Hey,” she said gently. “You conscious yet, Haught?”

Nicole opened her eyes slowly, running a hand over her face. “Mostly. I took more aspirin than is entirely healthy, but since when I woke up I literally wanted to die and now I don’t, I’ll write it off as acceptable.”

“How do you feel?”

“I was at the level of three hangovers and now I’m only at one.”

“Well, that’s at least tolerable.”

Nicole gave a low, scoffing laugh. “I guess so.”

Wynonna was silent for a long moment. “What happened, Nicole?”

“I don’t even know. I just walked in my door, and that symbol was on my wall. Something was there, Wy. Something was holding me in place, and that mark carved itself into my shoulder. And I couldn’t get out. I tried the door, but I was thrown back inside. A part of me wanted to think I was imagining things, I went about the rest of my night, showered, slept, got up the next morning and changed, but that mark was still there. On my arm and on the wall. And that’s when I knew that it was really happening. I called Nedley to tell him I couldn’t come in. What else was I going to say? ‘Help I’m being held hostage by ghosts’? I’d rather not spend the whole semester in counseling.”

“You should have called one of us,” Xavier said quietly as he stepped into the room. “We would’ve come to help.”

“What, bring one of you to a place where a ghost was literally tormenting me and had already sliced me up? Yeah, no, that wasn’t going to happen.”

Wynonna squeezed her briefly. “Next time _anything_ happens to you, Nicole- obviously I’m hoping it’s not ‘attempted murder by ghost’ but whatever –you need to call me. One of us. I’m serious. Because my sister cares so damn much about you, _we_ care so damn much about you, and I do not want to see you get hurt just because you’re too stubbornly protective to ask for help. Got it?”

“Got it.”

Doc walked in from the adjoining room, a bag slung over his shoulder. “Car’s packed. You ready?”

“Yeah,” Wynonna said, getting to her feet.

“Wait, what’s happening?” Nicole asked, running a hand over her face again.

“The three of us are heading back to campus now, in Xavier’s SUV. He needs to check in since he’s an RA, plus we want to scope out Yancy Hall to see if anything weird has happened there since you were trapped in your place. You’re going to stay here until your headache is gone and you’ve actually eaten food and showered and changed and started to feel like a regular person again, and then you and Waverly can follow in her Jeep.” She paused. “We’re going to fight this thing, Nic. Are you still willing to do that?”

“Now more than ever.”

“Good.” Wynonna headed back for the other room. She hesitated in the doorway. “Oh, we dropped your cat off with my aunt. She was a bit snarky about it, but that just means she was okay with it. We figured she’d be safer in company that didn’t involve evil spirits or hotel rooms.”

“Who was snarky, your aunt or my cat?”

Wynonna picked a towel up off the TV stand and threw it at Nicole’s head. “My aunt, jackass.”

Nicole caught the towel clumsily, giving a quiet laugh. “Thank you, Wynonna.”

“Of course. Take care of your shoulder, Haught.”

Wynonna and the boys turned and walked back into their room, shutting the door behind them.

 

+++

 

Randy Nedley looked up as Chrissy walked into his office at the campus police headquarters and sat down in front of his desk.

“What are you doing here, kid?”

“You said Nicole hadn’t shown up to work in about a week. Well, Xavier Dolls was late showing up to campus today. Waverly hasn’t gotten here at all yet, even though I saw Wynonna.”

Nedley leaned back in his chair. “You think their little Black Badge Division got into something?”

“Dad, you know that I didn’t… _entirely_ believe you when you warned me that this campus was haunted.”

“If I recall your exact words were ‘stop trying to scare me old man, I’m going to college’. If I recall.”

Chrissy grimaced. “Right. But since I’ve been here… this campus is _wrong_ , Dad. And Waverly and Nicole and their friends, they keep getting more and more paranoid. I don’t even know if they realize they’re doing it, but before we went on break Waverly would check the locks four times before going to sleep. Whether your theories about ghost stories are true or not, something’s got them spooked. I’m worried about them.”

“I’ll try calling Waverly. If I don’t get an answer, I’ll go have a chat with Xavier Dolls. I won’t bring the hauntings up, but I’ll do what I can to make sure Waverly and Nicole are both okay, and that those kids are being as safe as they can possibly be. Fair?”

“Perfectly.”

“Go do your homework.”

Chrissy gave a small grin. “Sure, Dad.”

 

+++

 

After another few hours, Nicole leaned down and pressed a soft kiss to the top of Waverly’s head. “Waves,” she murmured. “C’mon, Waves, we can’t stay here forever.”

Without opening her eyes, Waverly grumbled under her breath and pulled Nicole closer by her belt loop. “Why not?”

“Your sister and the boys went back to campus to chase ghosts.”

Waverly’s eyes snapped open, and she looked up at Nicole. “Those _bastards_. What do they think they’re _doing_?”

“Haven’t got a clue. They didn’t want us to follow until we were ready though.”

“Well of _course_ we’re- oh.” Waverly flushed, giving Nicole an embarrassed smile. “Sorry. Are you okay?”

“I think I’ll need like an hour or so before I’m ready to leave, and we’re definitely getting food on the way, but other than that I am totally ready.”

“You’re sure?”

“I’m sure.”

Waverly pulled her forward, kissing her lightly on the cheek. “Go ahead, then. You left some of your clothes in my room, so I brought them with us as we were leaving. Didn’t have a snapback, though.”

Nicole chuckled. “That’s perfectly okay. I’ll survive.”

“Not sure I will, though.”

“You’ll survive,” Nicole said, kissing her on the forehead. She sat up and heard a cellphone ring on the nightstand. Instinctively, without giving it a single thought, she picked it up and answered it, “Hello?”

“ _Haught?_ ”

Nicole realized two things simultaneously. First, the voice on the other end of the line was that of her boss, Nedley. Second, she had accidentally answered Waverly’s phone.

“Oh. Uh. Hi. Sir.”

Waverly’s wide-eyed gaze gaped up at her in horror, and she mouthed, ‘ _What does he want?_ ’

‘ _I don’t know!_ ’ Nicole mouthed in response.

“ _Haught, are you okay? I haven’t heard from you._ ”

“U-Uh, yeah, uh, I’m fine. I was, uh, I was sick, and I completely forgot to pick my phone up and call you after that first day, and, uh-”

“ _Haught?_ ”

“Sir?”

“ _I’m not an idiot. You’re giving me bullshit._ ”

Nicole gave a nervous laugh into the phone. “Well, sir, I’m not sure what you want me to say. It’s not like I was trapped in my house by attacking ghosts or something.”

Waverly smacked her in the arm.

There was a long pause on Nedley’s end of the line. “ _Look, Nicole, given the lack of communication from you, I have to suspend you for a week._ ” He paused again. “ _Feel better._ ”

“Y-Yes, sir.”

Nedley hung up, and Nicole lowered the phone from her ear slowly, shock on her face. Waverly gently pulled on her sleeve. “Nic? Nicky, what is it? What’s wrong?”

“I-I…” Nicole stared at the phone for a long moment. “I think my boss knows ghosts are real.”


	15. Chapter 15

**FEBRUARY 4**

“Explain to me again why you think Nedley knows about the ghosts.”

Nicole put her milkshake back into the cup holder of Waverly’s Jeep and sighed. “I don’t know. It’s just, that sarcastic confession? Before I said that, I honestly thought he was going to fire me. He wasn’t messing around. I know I wasn’t very convincing in my lie, but still, he called me out on it immediately. Once I ‘jokingly’ told him what happened, he just… I really don’t know, but the way he hesitated, the way he changed gears and just talked about how I hadn’t called and that he was suspending me, I can’t really explain it fully but I feel it. He knows.”

Waverly sighed and stopped at a red light. “What do you want to do about it?”

“I’m not sure there’s anything _to_ do. I can’t exactly confront him. If I’m wrong I look like a lunatic.” Nicole played with her straw, staring straight ahead out the window. “I think I’ll just pay attention. See if I notice anything weird about him. Go from there.”

“Do you want to tell the others?”

“Not until I’m sure.”

“Okay.” Waverly glanced in her mirror, noting that there was no one behind her on the empty road. She reached over and took Nicole’s hand. “By the way. There’s something I’ve been meaning to tell you.”

Nicole turned to her, brow furrowed. “What is it?”

“I love you,” Waverly murmured.

After a brief hesitation, Nicole laughed softly. “You already told me that, you know.”

Waverly tightened her grip on Nicole’s hand. “Not in person. Not to your face. And I needed to say it.”

Nicole circled her thumb around Waverly’s palm. “Hey, Wave?”

“Yeah?”

Nicole grinned and pretended to tap her fingers against a hat she wasn’t wearing. “I love you too.”

Waverly laughed. “You’re a cliché.”

“Oh, sure.” Nicole scoffed and shook her head. “This coming from the woman who went for the candles-plus-LBD cliché.”

“Look, _Haught_ , I didn’t see you _complaining_.”

“That’s because I’m not an _idiot_ ,” Nicole said, leaning towards Waverly slightly with a smirk on her face.

Waverly shifted the car into park and dragged Nicole as far over as she could under the restrictions of the other woman’s seatbelt. She kissed her hard on the mouth for several seconds and then pushed her back into her seat. She put the car back in drive and continued towards the university.

“What was that about?” Nicole asked with a laugh.

“You’re stupidly attractive and it’s annoying.”

“That doesn’t sound like a problem, Waves.”

“Shut up, Nicole.”

“You guys all say that a lot. I’m gonna start taking offense.”

“ _Shut up, Nicole._ ”

Nicole grinned again and slipped into her drawling accent, one that she usually kept subdued. “Yes, ma’am.”

Waverly groaned and rested her head on the steering wheel.

“You’re going to crash the car, Waverly.”

“Good. Put me out of my misery.”

“Wave.”

Waverly lifted her head back up and stared straight ahead at the road. “When your shoulder heals you’re in trouble.”

“Sounds like fun,” Nicole said mildly, picking her milkshake back up from the cup holder.

“You’re the worst.”

“And yet you love me.”

Waverly couldn’t help the smile that formed on her face as she turned onto campus. “And yet.”

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 6**

 

Doc leaned his chair back onto two legs and put his feet up onto the table in the library study room they had commandeered. “Shall we discuss our plans for moving forward?”

“I’d like to try to get that symbol off of the wall of Nicole’s place,” Xavier said. “There has to be a way. First of all because I’m not sure that will go over well with her landlord, second of all because Wy might not have a roommate, but we can’t exactly make Nic sleep on the floor for the rest of the semester.”

“Yeah, and it’s _really_ killing my love life,” Waverly joked.

As Nicole playfully smacked Waverly’s arm, Wynonna snickered. “You mean your _sex_ life.”

Waverly sighed and stared at her. “We got that. Wynonna. We understood the implication. Please stop.”

“No. Sister’s prerogative.” Wynonna flipped through her Psych textbook casually. “We’ll do that first. Then we’ll stake out Yancy Hall. I’m guaranteeing that someone is planting those symbols in that building, and I want to know who it is. If we figure that out, maybe we’ll start to understand what’s really going on here.”

“Once that’s done, and only once that’s done, we should worry about the theatre,” Doc said. “I think it’s fairly transparent that the place is dangerous. Given that these spirits are clearly out for us, I’d rather not risk that journey before we’re fully prepared.”

“Agreed.” Xavier took a sip from a bottle of water. “Did we ever finish that list of other buildings that are suspiciously likely haunted?”

“Uh, yeah.” Nicole stole Waverly’s binder from her and flipped through it. “In addition to Yancy and Remington, there’s Polk, East, and Ombers.”

“And your house.”

Nicole gritted her teeth and threw a pen at Wynonna. “ _And my house._ ”

“Just making sure we’re clear on that.”

“By the way, I figured out what the symbol means.”

Everyone in the room went dead quiet, staring blankly at Waverly. “You’re… just telling us this now?” Xavier asked slowly.

“I only recently put it together.” Waverly ran a finger over the back of Nicole’s hand. “Sometimes anger is a pretty good motivational tool.” She pulled the binder back and flipped towards the end of it. “The reason it was so hard to find was because it isn’t a known symbol. From what I can tell it’s a combination of three separate summoning symbols from three separate ancient religions. It’s ridiculous. There’s no way it should work. It shouldn’t do _anything_. But apparently, it combines in just the right way, however it’s being done, to cause complete and utter chaos.” She paused. “And ghosts. It also causes ghosts.”

“We can figure that much,” Wynonna said dryly. “And indication on why someone would decide to combine these three things?”

“Haven’t gotten there yet. I’m getting close, but it’s such a bizarre combination of things that it’s taking some time.”

“Well, we can’t wait for it.” Xavier looked at Nicole. “I think we should try to go into your rental this weekend. See if we can get rid of whatever’s in there without getting ourselves killed.”

“O-Okay.”

“You don’t have to go if you don’t want to,” Waverly murmured.

Nicole shook her head. “I’ll be fine.”

Waverly gave a thin smile and kissed Nicole on the cheek. “You’d better.” She put her binder back in her bag and stood up. “I should get to class. Boys, you both have class now too, don’t you?”

Xavier and Doc both grumbled under their breath and stood. Xavier kissed Wynonna quickly, and he, Doc, and Waverly all left the room.

Wynonna carefully slid Nicole’s pen back across the table to her. “Hey. You’re sure you’re alright?”

Nicole took in a deep breath and shivered. “No. I still hear that music echoing in my head sometimes. My shoulder hurts like hell. I’m exhausted. But I can’t focus on it. I can’t let it win. And I can’t let Waverly worry.”

“Tough, because we all worry.” Wynonna grinned. “We’re the goddamn Black Badge Division, Haughtpants. We’re a team. You’re not going to get away with hiding the fact that you’re not okay.”

“Girl can try.”

“You’d better not _continue_ trying to hide this shit from Waverly, because she’ll kick your ass.”

Nicole grimaced. “You make a fair point there.”

Wynonna turned the page of her textbook. “That’s because I’m a genius, Nic. That’s the Earp family secret. I’m actually the smart one.”

“I’ll have to run that theory by Waverly. I can’t just accept it outright. It would end badly for me.”

“Whipped.”

Nicole just shrugged and pulled her laptop out of her bag. “Is it the wrong choice?”

“Not even a little bit.”

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 9**

 

When the group walked into Nicole’s housing, it was eerily quiet.

“The silence is creeping me out,” Wynonna muttered as she slowly headed towards the living room.

“Better than the damn piano music,” Nicole replied.

“Fair.” Wynonna stopped in her tracks, confusion flickering across her face. “Okay, what the hell.”

“What is it? What’s wrong?” Xavier moved over to her and stopped next to her. “What the…”

The wall where the symbol had been painted was clear and blank, as if nothing had ever been on it. Not a single speck of paint was visible, and the drywall didn’t appear to have been replaced. The small dent from an ill-advised wrestling match between Doc and Xavier was even still in the exact place it had always been.

“I never want to live in this place again,” Nicole said in a quiet voice.

“I do not blame you,” Waverly murmured.

Doc glanced at Xavier. “What do you suppose we do now?”

Xavier sighed. “Well, there’s not much we can do about this besides be confused. So we get Nicole’s stuff out of this place- because clearly it is not safe for her to be here –and we continue with our plan.” He put his hands in his pockets and gave a humorless smile. “It’s time for us to prepare a stakeout.”


	16. Chapter 16

**FEBRUARY 10**

“You’re lucky you’re such a damn good cop, Haught,” Nedley said gruffly, tossing the keys to one of the patrol cars across his desk to Nicole.

Nicole spun the keys through her fingers absentmindedly, biting her lip. “I’m sorry if I disappointed you, sir.”

“You may be an adult, Nicole, but you’re also still a kid. Just because I expect a lot from you doesn’t mean I don’t also expect some screw-ups.” He leaned forward. “But I’m serious on this one, Haught. You’ve made some mistakes this year that are difficult to overlook. Some that could’ve ended very badly. You’ve got to start paying more attention, or you might end up getting someone killed.”

“Not to sound apathetic, sir, but I’m just an intern college cop. Am I really dealing with life or death here?” Nicole winced slightly, knowing that the bad attempt at deflecting the danger sounded more ‘asshole’ than ‘casual’.

Nedley stared at her for a long moment. “You know that student that went missing last semester?”

“Yes, sir.”

“We found her body in Remington Hall a few weeks ago.”

For what felt like an eternity, Nicole couldn’t say anything. Then, softly, she asked, “Which date?”

“January 25.”

The blood drained from Nicole’s face. “That’s the date that…”

As she trailed off, Nedley narrowed his eyes. “ _What_ date, Haught?”

“N-Nothing, sir. U-Uh. What happened? To her?”

“It would seem that she jumped off the top balcony of the theatre. Killed herself.”

“But she was missing for weeks.”

Nedley shrugged. “If we understood the disturbed mind, Haught, we might’ve been able to stop this before it happened. Local P.D. is investigating to make sure this is actually a suicide. Our priority is keeping the students safe.”

Nicole couldn’t help the dry laugh as a sharp pang of pain went through her shoulder. “Easier said than done.”

“Is there something you aren’t telling me, Haught?”

There was a lengthy hesitation as they both just stared at each other. Then, quietly, Nicole said, “No, sir.”

“You’d tell me if there was?”

“Of course, sir.”

Nedley was quiet. “Your shifts start up again tomorrow, Nicole. Make sure you show up for them.”

Nicole, avoiding his gaze, nodded. “Yes, sir.”

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 11**

 

Doc hopped the back of the couch and sat down next to Xavier. “Did you get that text message from Nicole yesterday?”

Xavier closed his textbook and set his salad on top of it. “The one about the body in the theatre?”

“Indeed. What do you make of it?”

“It’s definitely suspicious. The day that the only one of us still in the area gets intentionally trapped in her house by ghosts is also the day someone who has been missing for over a month suddenly decides to kill herself in a building that is haunted by those same ghosts?” Xavier scoffed and shook his head. “Coincidences are possible, but not coincidences _that_ big.”

Doc gave a grim nod. “They’re killing people,” he said softly. “Whoever’s planting those symbols. They’re killing people. Or at least targeting people who want to kill themselves and convincing them to die in places that work in their favor.”

“The thing I can’t figure out is _why_. What could somebody _possibly_ gain from doing this much damage? To innocent people, to this school?”

“You’re the Criminal Justice major, my friend.”

“I haven’t exactly gotten training on people who summon ghosts.”

Doc unwrapped his cheeseburger and shrugged. “Then perhaps that’s the kind of research you need to start looking into.”

“I guess it is,” Xavier said quietly, opening his textbook again.

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 15**

 

“How did we end up the first pair volunteered for this?” Waverly asked mildly, putting her feet up on the dash of Wynonna’s truck.

“Handful of reasons,” Wynonna replied, tossing a chip into her mouth. “One: We’re the best, so we’re the most natural choice. Two: If it had been you and Nicole, you would’ve ended up just having sex instead of paying attention to the building.”

“ _Hey!_ ”

“Three: I wanted to spend some time with you.”

Waverly gave a low laugh and shook her head. She picked up her camera and aimed it at Yancy to get a better view of the door. “We just got back from break. I’ve spent about a month and a half with you.”

Wynonna lightly pushed Waverly’s head to one side. “Yeah, yeah. Don’t be such a twerp.”

“How are your classes so far?” Waverly asked after another quick laugh.

“Not bad. It’s a bit hard to concentrate on them after everything that’s happened. But it’s not bad.” Wynonna grinned mischievously. “Maybe I’ll write a paper on that month you spent speaking in a British accent.”

“Look. I was twelve.”

“Look. I don’t care.”

Waverly rolled her eyes, breaking off a piece of the chocolate bar they had stored in the cup holder between them. They sat in silence for a few minutes, silently watching the building. Then, softly, Waverly said, “I told Nicole that I love her.”

Wynonna gave a gentle smile and ran a hand down Waverly’s hair. “I can tell that you do,” she murmured. “I’m _glad_ that you do.”

“You are?” Waverly asked, meeting Wynonna’s gaze hesitantly.

The older Earp pulled her sister forward, kissing her on the top of the head. “You’re happy, and she’s good for you. She’s a cocky bastard, but she’s good.”

Waverly laughed loudly, holding the camera up again. “Yeah, she definitely knows she’s hot and uses it to her advantage. Asshole.”

“You can’t tell me that you don’t turn that around on her. C’mon. You’re _my_ sister.”

“I… might,” Waverly said slowly.

“That’s my girl.”

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 16**

 

Nicole tapped against Waverly’s dorm door once before opening it and stepping inside, nodding in greeting at both Waverly and Wynonna. “Hey. How did it go last night?”

Wynonna shrugged. “Unless the symbols are being left by our campus raccoon, we got nothing.”

“Well, I guess we couldn’t expect to get info on the first try.” Nicole pulled her hat down slightly. “I’m sorry to say that we know nothing new about that girl’s ‘suicide’, either. And my mother is starting to ask why I’ve been staying at a hotel instead of the off-campus housing, so I need to start coming up with an explanation before I end up completely screwed.”

Waverly grinned softly and walked over to her. “She’s not going to buy the ghost explanation?”

“Would _you_?”

“Probably not.” Waverly got so close to Nicole that she was practically standing on her boots and reached up to turn Nicole’s hat backwards. “At least you wouldn’t be lying to her.” She stayed where she was standing but turned her head towards Wynonna. “Who’s getting the shift tonight?”

“Xavier and Doc.”

“Oh, that should be entertaining. They work well together but also are completely ridiculous, so it will probably be a disaster. We should put a recording device in the car.”

Wynonna laughed. “Yeah, we probably should. If only so that we can call the police if they start trying to kill each other. I think…” She trailed off, smirking. “Hey, Haught, you okay?”

Waverly looked back up at Nicole and saw that she was bright red, her jaw clenched as if she wanted to say something but couldn’t. Waverly realized in that moment that, as she talked to Wynonna, her hands had absentmindedly gone from Nicole’s belt buckle, to her belt loops, to her back pockets.

“I think you’re killing your girlfriend, Waves.”

“Fuck you, Earp,” Nicole managed through gritted teeth.

“Poor choice of words.” Still grinning, Wynonna headed for the door. “I think I’ll get out of here before this gets uncomfortable. Good luck with that, Nicky.”

She was cackling as she shut the door behind her.

“I’m going to kill her,” Nicole mumbled.

Waverly pulled her just a bit closer by her belt. “No, you won’t.”

“Why not?”

“You’re a good cop.”

“Untrue. I’ve never worn my uniform properly in my life.”

“Fair point. You also play Pokemon while on the job.”

Nicole scoffed. “I can do that pretty easily. And I can apparently multitask better than you can, since I keep taking your Gym from you.”

Waverly smirked. “Ah, yes, but you called it _my_ Gym. Which is what it is. My Gym. I let you borrow it sometimes, but it belongs to me.”

“I’m going to make sure you never get it back again.”

“Not likely.”

“Oh, really?”

Waverly pulled her closer again. “Really.”

Nicole swallowed, taking in a deep breath. Then she grabbed Waverly and spun her around, pushing her against the wall and kissing her.

After several minutes, Waverly gently pushed her back. “Where the hell did that come from?” she breathed.

“Frustration,” Nicole murmured.

Waverly gave a low laugh. “I’m getting you frustrated more often.”

“Sounds like a challenge.”

Waverly laughed again, kissing her softly. “Yeah. You _are_ a challenge.”


	17. Chapter 17

**FEBRUARY 16**

 

On her way out of the dorm, Wynonna ran into Chrissy heading in. “I wouldn’t do that if I were you.”

Chrissy grimaced. “Room’s taken?”

“Yep.”

“They’re both idiots,” Chrissy sighed, falling into step beside Wynonna.

“I know. I’d imagine that living with Waverly gets irritating sometimes.”

“Nah. She’s great. I don’t mind getting kicked out every once in a while. They usually go to Nicole’s place, and they never lock me out late at night or when I’m studying for a test or anything.” Chrissy shrugged. “Plus, I mean… Nicole’s better than any of the idiots Wave _could_ be dating.”

“God, trust me, I know. You should’ve seen the dumbass she dated in high school. I really wish I could’ve punched him in the face.”

“Well, I mean, you still could, technically. There just wouldn’t really be much of a point to it.”

“True. You’re no fun.”

Chrissy grinned. “What can I say? Dad’s a cop.” She tightened the straps of her backpack and took out her cellphone to respond to a text. “Hey, is Nicole okay?”

Wynonna paused, staring straight ahead. “Sure. Why wouldn’t she be?”

“Uh, well, she basically disappeared for a week. That’s definitely worrisome behavior.”

“She’s alright. She’s… Some weird stuff has been going on, but she’s handling it, I think.” Wynonna pulled her leather jacket tighter around her. “You don’t need to worry about her.” She gave a wide grin. “We take care of her.”

“I know you guys do. I just don’t want my dad to lose his favorite kid,” Chrissy joked.

“Aw, come on, he loves you more.”

Chrissy shook her head somberly. “I’m not sure. He grounds her a lot less often than he ever did me.”

“Give him time,” Wynonna said. “Nicole’s a good cop but she’s also a disaster; she’ll get grounded again, I’m sure.”

They both laughed. “Alright, I’m going to go to the library for a few hours. Give the dork duo time to have clothes on and maybe even be asleep by the time I get back.”

“If you’re lucky.”

“Don’t test me, Earp.” Chrissy grinned and headed off in the direction of the library.

 

+++

 

“What do you reckon is going on here? Cult trying to destroy the school? Idiotic experimentation? Aliens?”

Xavier laughed and held up his binoculars, looking through them at Yancy Hall. “Could be anything. I’m not really thinking it’s aliens, but at this point I would believe it.” He lowered the binoculars and took a sip from his bottle of water. “Doc, I have a question that you’ve probably been asked before.”

“I’m sorry, Xavier, I can’t in good faith date you until you’ve broken up with Wynonna. Of course, then I’d probably swoop in and steal her, first.”

Xavier rolled his eyes. “Why do you _always_ dress like this? Sure, ‘method acting’ but you’re not actually playing a role. You’re just being weird.”

Doc grinned. “Why, of course I’m playing a role. I’m being a cowboy. A cowboy with _honor_. I’m positioning myself to be the hero of this piece, Mr. Dolls.”

“This is life, John Henry. There aren’t heroes or villains, only people who are good or bad or somewhere in between.”

“Well, I see that as a pretty boring way to look at things.” Doc put his feet up on the dash of Xavier’s SUV. “Everybody has something that they want to be. I want to be the kind of person who sees the darker sides of the world while still fighting for it. Standing in the shadows while shooting on behalf of the light. The truest definition of the anti-hero. The true cowboy hero.”

“You’re an odd man, John Henry.”

“Says the man who wants to be a professional crimefighter.”

Xavier hesitated, raising his binoculars again. “I guess I can’t argue with you on that one.”

“Was that an _agreement_ from _Xavier Dolls_? Somebody pinch me, I believe I must be dreaming.”

“Remind me when we next see the group, I’m stealing Nicole’s taser and using it on you.”

“That’s just poor sportsmanship.”

“Yeah, well…”

Doc glanced at Xavier, frowning as the other man trailed off. “Did you forget how to make a comeback?”

“No. I got distracted by the man walking into the building we’re supposed to be watching.”

“Shit,” Doc mumbled, sitting up in his seat and staring at Yancy Hall. “What do you want to do?”

“Uh, investigate?”

“What do you want to do that won’t get us both killed?”

“Doc.”

“Yeah, yeah, I know.”

The two men got out of the SUV and hurried towards the building.

Neither realized they had left their cellphones behind.

 

+++

 

It was almost midnight, but Waverly couldn’t sleep. She sat on the edge of her bed, watching silently as Nicole laid in what was somehow a heap on the other side, out completely. Nicole Haught basically slept like an exhausted puppy, and Waverly honestly never had the guts to tell her how damn adorable it was.

She shifted her position and Nicole stirred, and Waverly mentally cursed herself for forgetting that her girlfriend was also the lightest sleeper she had ever seen.

Fell asleep fast, woke up even faster.

“What’s wrong?” Nicole whispered, looking up at her through a fuzzy gaze.

“Nothing.” Waverly paused. “You’re cute when you sleep.”

Nicole smirked faintly. “Only when I sleep?”

“Well, yeah, because then you aren’t talking.”

“Ouch, Waverly. Ouch.”

Waverly reached over and gently ran her fingers through Nicole’s hair. “I love you.”

“At this point I’d hope so.”

“God, you’re a _smartass_ , you know that?”

“Got a nice ass, too,” Nicole mumbled.

“Oh for fuck’s sake. I should withhold sex for a week just for the arrogance in that statement.”

“You won’t.”

“That should make it two weeks.”

Nicole shrugged. “You still won’t.”

“Asshole.” Waverly leaned down and kissed her. “How are you doing?”

“Better now.” Nicole hesitated. “I should… I’m still half-asleep and god knows what time it is so I probably shouldn’t bring this up now, but… it’s not… always easy.”

Waverly moved closer to her. “What do you mean?”

“I still hear the music sometimes. It gives me headaches. And sometimes my shoulder still hurts like hell.”

“Nic…” Waverly stroked the other woman’s cheek gently. “Why didn’t you just tell me? You went through a trauma. You’re going to still suffer from it on occasion, or maybe even often. You don’t need to deal with it by yourself.”

“Yeah, that’s basically what Wynonna told me.”

“ _Wynonna_ knows?”

Nicole flinched at the faint offense in Waverly’s voice. “She’s probably my best friend.”

“I get that. But I’m surprised she didn’t rat you out.”

“She wanted me to get the spine to do it myself.” Nicole smiled weakly. “Guess it took a while for the courage to come through, huh?”

Waverly leaned down again and kissed her softly. “I’m glad that it happened eventually.”

“Still love me?” Nicole asked with a small smirk.

“Oh, trust me, you are not getting away _that_ easy.” Waverly laughed and went to kiss Nicole again, but froze just short.

“What’s wrong? Are you okay?”

“ _Shit_ ,” Waverly whispered. She backed up from Nicole and pulled her phone off of her nightstand.

“Waves?” Now fully awake, Nicole sat up and ran her hand down her girlfriend’s back. “Wave, what’s going on?”

“Chrissy never comes back past eleven.”

“You don’t think she stayed out because of me?”

“No, she’s never done that. She knows we’re always respectful of her need to sleep like a normal human being. She’s _always back by eleven_ , or she texts me to say she’ll be late.”

Nicole’s brain hadn’t quite caught up to the fact that she was awake. “So… So what does that mean?”

Waverly swallowed. “It means I have no idea where my roommate is.”


	18. Chapter 18

**FEBRUARY 17**

Wynonna groaned loudly and tumbled out of bed, stalking over to her door and swinging it open. Waverly was standing in front of her in sweatpants and a sweatshirt that was too big for her, urgency in her eyes.

“What the fuck, Wave. It’s one in the morning.”

“I can’t find Chrissy,” Waverly said, pushing her way into Wynonna’s dorm room.

“What?”

“She didn’t come back to the room. I’ve been calling everyone I can think to call for the past hour. Nobody knows where she is.”

“Last I saw her was around three. She was headed for the library.”

“The library closes at midnight this week.”

Wynonna hesitated for a long moment, staring at her sister. “Okay. Alright. She should definitely be back by now, then. Have you called the boys?”

Waverly gave a short, helpless shake of her head. “They’re not answering.”

“Christ. Okay.” Wynonna took a sweatshirt out of her closet and pulled it over her head. “Where’s Nicole?”

“She was checking a few other options before heading in this direction. She should be here soon.”

There was a knock on Wynonna’s door.

“Damn. Your girl’s got _timing_.” Wynonna opened her dorm door and found Nicole standing in the hallway in her uniform. “Really, Nic? The uniform? It’s an emergency and it’s after midnight.”

“It’s the only clothing I had in Waverly’s room other than the sweatshirt she’s wearing. Plus, if we’re going to end up doing something stupid and heading into campus, looking official can only help me.”

“Of course we’re going further into campus. Right?” Waverly turned to Wynonna.

“Absolutely. Even if only because I want to know why the boys aren’t answering and because I want to make sure Chrissy isn’t somewhere between her dorm and the library. Are you both ready to go now?”

When Nicole and Waverly both nodded, Wynonna picked a flashlight up off of her desk. “Then let’s get going.”

 

+++

 

“Their phones are still in the car, so I guess that’s why they aren’t answering,” Wynonna said as she peered through the driver’s side window of Xavier’s SUV. “God, both of them are idiots.”

“Don’t tell me. We get to go inside of Yancy Hall,” Nicole said softly.

Wynonna put an arm around Nicole’s shoulders and hugged her tightly. “Come on, Nic. Where’s your sense of adventure?”

“I lost it when I gained the pain in the shoulder you’re squeezing right now.”

“Right. Sorry.” Wynonna released Nicole, lightly pushing her hat forward as she stepped back. “Come on. It’s just a building.” She headed off towards the entrance.

Waverly lightly ran her fingers up Nicole’s spine. “You okay?”

“Nope. But I’m not backing out now.”

“Black Badge Division or bust?”

Nicole laughed and pressed a kiss to Waverly’s temple. “Damn straight.”

“Nothing about you is straight,” Waverly teased.

“God, don’t I know it.”

“Hey!” Wynonna yelled from the doorway of Yancy Hall. “Can you two stop flirting? We have things to do!” She paused. “Don’t make that dirty!”

Waverly and Nicole both laughed, and Waverly leaned against Nicole briefly. “I hate my sister.”

“You don’t.”

“Some days I wish I could.”

Nicole put an arm around Waverly and started leading her towards Wynonna. “You don’t,” she repeated.

Waverly gave a long slow, sigh. “You’re right.”

“Always am.”

“Keep telling yourself that.”

“I will.”

 

+++

 

Inside Yancy Hall, everything was silent and dark.

“I regret my enthusiasm,” Wynonna mumbled.

“I regret your enthusiasm, too,” Nicole replied.

“Shut up, Nicole.”

They walked through the hallways, flashlight beams dancing across the walls. When they found a door with a blood red symbol on it, they stopped dead.

“Oh, I was really hoping we wouldn’t find one of those,” Waverly said slowly.

“Are you surprised?” Wynonna asked in a mutter.

“Not at all.”

Wynonna stole the taser off of Nicole’s belt and opened the door cautiously. She stepped inside, closely followed by Waverly and Nicole.

Xavier and Doc were in the room, crouched over a person lying on the ground. Xavier turned immediately as the door opened, raising his flashlight defensively. He lowered it just as quickly when he recognized the women.

“What are you three doing here?”

“We got worried when- oh, God.” Waverly hurried forward and got down next to Doc.

Chrissy Nedley was lying on the floor, seemingly unconscious, a bloody wound on her forehead.

“Is she okay?” Waverly demanded.

“Don’t know yet,” Doc said. “We need to get her out of here, but we weren’t sure whether we should move her.”

“Uh, we should probably just call an ambulance,” Nicole said.

“Do you really want to explain why we’re in this building again?” Wynonna snapped.

“Wynonna, she’s _bleeding_. I will gladly lose my job if it means she’s safe.”

“Guys, I don’t think we have time to debate this,” Xavier said in a low voice.

“Why?” Wynonna and Nicole asked simultaneously.

“Because the building’s on fire.”

Everyone turned and looked out into the hallway, seeing flames in the room opposite them.

“Just when I thought this building couldn’t get worse,” Nicole said dryly.

“We have to go,” Wynonna said. “Doc, Xavier, get Chrissy. We have to go.” She headed for the door, but it slammed shut in front of her.

“Oh… that’s not good.”

 

+++

 

Nicole regained consciousness while choking. The first thing she saw was a pitch-black night sky. The second thing she saw was the furious and worried face of Randy Nedley.

“What the _hell_ happened in there, Haught?” he demanded.

“What?” she asked in a rasping voice.

He grabbed her by the shoulder and pulled her up into a sitting position. “Breathe. Just breathe.” He patted her roughly on the back, and his tone softened. “What happened, Haught?”

Nicole looked up at Yancy Hall and saw that it was completely engulfed in flames. Around her, the others were also waking up, being attended to by paramedics and other campus cops.

“This campus is haunted,” she whispered. “You probably won’t believe me, but this campus is haunted, and somebody’s causing it on purpose.”

Nedley stared across the grass at his daughter, being put into an ambulance. After a pause, he said, “I believe you. And whoever is causing it isn’t just doing it on purpose, Haught.” He gripped her shoulder tightly. “They want all of you dead.”


	19. Chapter 19

**FEBRUARY 17**

 

“I need you to explain to me what went down in that building, Nicole,” Nedley asked softly as he sat down across from her in the campus police interview room. “I need you to tell me, right now, because Yancy Hall is burning to the ground as we speak, and you and your friends were inside of it when it went up.”

Nicole rubbed at her eyes, still stinging from the smoke. “Honestly, sir, I don’t know. I really don’t know. Waverly hadn’t fallen asleep yet and she realized that Chrissy hadn’t come back to the dorm. We spent an hour trying to find her, then went to Wynonna for help. At that point we realized we couldn’t get in touch with Xavier or Doc, either.”

“You were in Waverly and Chrissy’s dorm room tonight, then?”

“… Yeah.” Nicole paused. “You know I’m dating Waverly, don’t you?”

“That particular bit of gossip has crossed my table, yes.”

“Okay. So, yeah, I was in their dorm room. But Chrissy wasn’t, and the boys weren’t picking up their phones, so we couldn’t ask them if they had seen anything.”

“Because they were camped out in front of Yancy Hall.”

“Er… yeah.”

“Why?”

Nicole swallowed, biting her lip. “We’ve been staking the building out, because we’ve been trying to catch whoever’s intentionally summoning ghosts.”

Nedley just stared at her for a long moment before sighing and closing his eyes. “Why, for the love of God, would you five do something like that?”

“Because whoever it was attacked me over break,” Nicole said without thinking.

“They _what_?”

“Shit.”

Nedley shook his head slowly. “Trapped in your house by attacking ghosts. I had a feeling you were being honest with me. I guess I was just hoping I was wrong.”

Nicole rubbed her shoulder absentmindedly. “Well, you weren’t. Somebody put a summoning symbol on the wall of my housing, a ghost carved a similar mark into my shoulder, it was a really awful week and I’m still a bit screwed up from it. So we’ve been a bit pissed off at whatever asshole decided to play _The Exorcist_ on campus.”

“It’s more like _Ghostbusters (2016)_ , isn’t it?”

“True, but only if I get to shoot a ghost in the face with a proton gun.”

Nedley gave a quick, scoffing laugh. “You’re a smartass, aren’t you?”

“You knew that when you hired me.”

“If I remember correctly, the second thing you said to me during the interview was ‘can I arrest one of my friends for not returning a book they borrowed a year ago’.”

“Wynonna Earp is a _thief_.”

“And you’re a _smartass_.”

Nicole smiled and looked down at her hands. “I’m sorry.”

“For what?”

“Not telling you the truth. For the fact that I have no idea what happened to Chrissy.”

“That’s okay,” Nedley said, his voice still low. “What happened with the fire?”

“Wynonna, Waverly, and I went into the Hall to find Xavier and Doc. We found a door with this symbol painted on it, the same one that was on my wall and that keeps showing up. When we went inside we found the boys and Chrissy. Wynonna and I were debating whether we should move her or just call the paramedics when we noticed the fire in the room across the hall. Then the door slammed shut. Wynonna, Xavier, and Doc managed to force it back open, but we didn’t get very far. I don’t remember much else. I blacked out.”

“You’re all _lucky_. Garcia, the cop on duty tonight? He was passing Yancy as the smoke started to come out of one of the room. Called it in. You’re _lucky_.”

Nicole coughed and rubbed at her throat. “Don’t feel all that lucky, but I guess it’s nice to not be dead.”

“Are you going to continue your stakeouts?”

“Probably. Just probably not of Yancy, since, uh…”

“Since it’s on fire?”

“Right.”

Nedley leaned back in his chair, studying her for a moment. “You’re going to get yourself killed, Nicole. It’s pretty obvious at this point that you kids are getting involved in something that someone doesn’t want you involved in. They’re going to kill you, and even if ghosts _are_ real, you shouldn’t exactly be looking to that as a retirement option.”

“Whoever this is, they attacked Chrissy, sir. They can’t have known that we’d go looking for her, that we’d even _think_ to look for her in Yancy. They targeted her, or at the very least just wanted to kill her for some reason. That girl that killed herself in Remington, I think that was set up by the same people. Something is happening, sir. People are dying. Maybe this isn’t our concern, but we’re not going to just let it go. We can’t. If you want to fire me for that, go ahead. I’m not going to sit by and wait while students on this campus get hurt.”

“You’re a good cop, Nicole,” Nedley said. “It would be a disservice to fire you for trying to protect people.” He held out his hand palm up. “But until this is over, I can’t let you wear that badge. Not after everything that’s happened. I won’t say that I’m keeping it. I won’t say you’ll never get it back. But for right now, I can’t let you wear that badge.”

Nicole swallowed and took in a deep breath. She unclipped her badge from her belt and handed it to him. “I understand,” she said in a hoarse voice. “Sir.”

She stood and walked out of the room as quickly as she could.

 

+++

 

Waverly was sitting on the floor when Nicole walked out of the interview room, and she was immediately struck by how _tired_ the other woman looked. It was entirely justified- Nicole had been woken up after barely two hours of sleep, dragged on a rescue mission, and then almost murdered in a fire –but it still made Waverly’s heart ache.

Nicole sat down next to her with a low, exhausted sigh and rubbed at her eyes with her hand.

“You need to sleep,” Waverly murmured.

“I can’t do that until we’re finished here.”

“Nic.” Waverly interlocked her fingers with Nicole’s. “You need to sleep. You look exhausted.”

“Thanks for the compliment; I love you too.”

“Don’t be an asshole. I’m serious.”

“You got less sleep than I did.”

“Yeah, but you’re…”

Nicole gave a dry laugh. “Still messed up?”

Waverly’s grip on Nicole’s hand tightened. “You’re tired.”

“Well, I’ll have plenty of time for rest from now on.”

The defeat in Nicole’s voice was what caught Waverly’s attention, even more than the words. “Nedley didn’t…”

Nicole just tapped the empty spot on her belt where her badge usually was.

“Christ, Nicole…”

“It’s okay.”

“No, it’s not.”

“We’re alive,” Nicole whispered. “It’s okay.”

Waverly gave a slow sigh and rested her head on Nicole’s good shoulder. “We shouldn’t have come back to campus. We should’ve just run off together.”

Nicole gave a gentle laugh. “Waverly Earp, you would run away with me?”

“Don’t sound so smug. The alternative is how painfully we’re about to die.”

“I’m going to stick to feeling smug.”

“Why did I ever agree to date you?”

Nicole laughed again and put her arm around Waverly, kissing her soot-stained hair softly. “If I remember correctly, _you_ basically jumped _me_ , about four times. Us dating was not my fault.”

“Of course it is. You’re too attractive.”

“I’m so sorry.”

“You should be.”

Nicole rested her chin on the top of Waverly’s head. “We’re not about to die, you know,” she mumbled. “We’ll be okay.”

“I think it’s pretty clear that we’re being targeted for death, Nicole. How can you be calm about that? Especially after what happened to you?”

“Because if I’m not calm, I might worry you.”

Waverly gave a soft laugh and shifted, leaning up to kiss Nicole on the cheek. “You’re too good for me, Haught.”

“I’m aware.” Nicole hugged her tighter. “But I think I’ll stick around anyway.”

 

+++

 

It felt like it took her six showers to clean off the soot and smoke, but when Waverly finally sat down at her desk in her pajamas to compose explanation emails to her professors, she knew that it was worth it.

She curled up in her chair and stared at her computer, trying to figure out what to write. What to say that would be a possible excuse. She knew that ‘almost died in a fire’ _was_ a legitimate excuse for missing class, but she didn’t really know whether she should give an explanation for why she was in the building in the first place.

Waverly glanced over at her bed, where Nicole was sprawled sound asleep. She watched her silently for what might’ve been half an hour, until an instant message popped up on her computer screen.

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _How are u doin?_

Waverly smiled slightly, leaned forward, and responded.

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _Ok. You?_

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _X is pissed. Thinks he should’ve stopped what happened to Chrissy. So I’m pissed at him for being stupid._

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _It’s not his fault_

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _I know_

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _Tell him that_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _I will._

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _What do u want to do?_

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _About what_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** …

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _I dunno_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _the ghosts?_

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _Oh. right._

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _we should stake out the theatre this weekend. Would you and nicole be up for that?_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _Nic’s asleep. I’ll ask her when she wakes up. She needs the rest._

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _so do you, baby girl_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _I know. I’m going soon._

**WHISKEY_FEVER:** _Good. ‘Night_

**SHOTGUNSMALL:** _Goodnight :D_

Waverly closed her computer, giving up on her explanation emails. At that exact moment, she honestly didn’t care what her professors thought. She could still smell smoke, her roommate was in the hospital, and her girlfriend had had her badge taken away from her.

The professors would get over it.

She moved over to her bed and lied down, pressing close against Nicole.

“Are you okay?” Nicole mumbled in her ear.

“Better now. Go back to sleep.”

“You’re sure you’re okay?”

Waverly pulled Nicole’s arms around her. “I’m sure. Go back to sleep.”

She waited until she heard Nicole’s breathing relax into a steady rhythm. Only then did she try to fall asleep herself.

 

+++

 

**FEBRUARY 23**

 

The Black Badge Division stood on the theatre stage in Remington Hall.

“What, we’re not going down into the basement this time?” Nicole joked.

“I don’t really reckon you have any interest in doing that,” Doc said.

“Not even a little bit.”

Xavier sat down on the stage and rubbed the back of his neck, thinking. “Okay. So that girl died in this building. It’s starting to look like Chrissy was meant to die in Yancy Hall.”

“I talked to her yesterday,” Waverly said, sitting next to him. “She said there was a guy heading towards Yancy Hall that she thought looked odd. She followed him, because it’s Chrissy, and when she turned the corner by Polk he was gone. She figured it was just a weirdo, but before she could turn back towards the dorms, someone hit her from behind. That’s all she remembers before she woke up in the ambulance.”

“If that’s our guy then it explains why Chrissy was chosen. Wrong place, wrong time.” Nicole fidgeted with the brim of her baseball cap. “But why kill people in those places? Sacrifices? Need for spilled blood? How would that work with Yancy burned to the ground?”

“Oh my God,” Waverly said suddenly. “Oh my God, I am an _idiot_.”

“About time you realized that,” Wynonna snarked from the spot she had claimed, directly behind Xavier leaning against him.

“What is it?” Xavier asked.

“The buildings we marked as potential or definite haunting sites. Remington, Yancy, Polk, East, and Ombers. They were all scheduled to be demoed five years ago, but they got delayed. Yancy wasn’t even supposed to be demolished anymore; they were just going to remodel it. There was a whole big chaotic mess about it, because the school had hired a construction company to do the work, everything was set up, and then at the last minute they backed out. The company had already bought everything they would need for the demolition, but the school refused to pay them for the situation. I’m pretty sure it went bankrupt and collapsed from the financial strain.” Waverly pulled her binder out of her bag and flipped through it. “Yeah, Del Ray Construction and Demolition. The entire company went under just because this school screwed them over.”

“Del Ray?” Doc frowned. “Isn’t there an architecture graduate student named Del Ray? His first name’s, uh… Baba or Lobo or something.”

“It’s Bobo,” a voice said from the upper level of seating.

The group looked up and saw an older, rough-looking student standing at the edge of the balcony, a blood red paintbrush in his hand. He gave them a vicious sneer.

“Robert ‘Bobo’ Del Ray, Jr. Congratulations on the history lesson. Too bad it came too late.”

He added a final line to a symbol painted on a theatre seat, and the stage underneath them started to shake.


	20. Chapter 20

**FEBRUARY 23**

“What is the plan here, Del Ray?” Wynonna demanded as the group quickly stood up. “Bring down the buildings your family’s company was forbidden from demolishing? How will that solve anything?”

“It’s _revenge_ , Earp. It doesn’t _need_ to solve anything.”

“Oo, boy, if that doesn’t sound like a bullshit excuse for chaos,” Waverly muttered.

The floor under her vibrated violently, causing her to loose her balance. She was caught at the last minute by Nicole, but an even more violent shake through the stage sent both of them to the ground.

“Ow.” Nicole rubbed the back of her head, gently pushing Waverly off of her. “That was passive-aggressive.”

“I didn’t know ghosts could be passive-aggressive. I figured they’d just be aggressive-aggressive.” Waverly put a hand on Nicole’s knee and used her to push herself back up onto her feet. “Your influence isn’t impressing me, Mr. Del Ray.” She held out her hand to help Nicole up.

“Seriously,” Nicole said, taking a few steps away from the group, Waverly at her side. “This is just pathetic haunting efforts, honestly. I mean what happened in the basement? Scary. The fire in Yancy? Scary. This? Eh. There are Pokedex entries scarier than this.”

“What in God’s name are you two doing?” Doc hissed through his teeth.

“Stop antagonizing the jackass who wants us dead and summons ghosts,” Wynonna growled.

Both women ignored them. “Nic has a point,” Waverly agreed. “Hypno? Abducts children who are never seen again.”

“Banette? Possessed dolls seeking revenge on the children that threw them away.”

“Drifblim carry children away to the underworld.”

“Yamask carries around a mask shaped in the face that it had when it was still human.”

“Honedge-”

“ _WOULD. YOU. BOTH. SHUT. UP,_ ” Bobo screeched from the balcony. He rested his paint-covered hand on the symbol and yelled, “ _Kill both of them!_ ”

“That’s the cue,” Waverly said.

“Never would’ve guessed,” Nicole replied dryly.

They turned and sprinted out the back door off of the stage that headed deeper into Remington Hall. Looking furious, Bobo ran up to the exit off of the balcony, shouting instructions at thin air.

Once he had left, Xavier shook his head. “Oh, those idiots.”

“What?”

He looked at Wynonna. “They’re making themselves targets. For our sakes.”

She just stared at him for a long moment. “I’m going to kill them both.”

A scream of pain in Waverly’s voice echoed from outside, and Doc swallowed. “I’m not sure you’re going to have to.”

“Waverly,” Wynonna whispered. She ran for the door, Xavier and Doc close on her heels.

When they got to the door, it was locked. The stage began to vibrate underneath them again.

“I don’t think we’re going to be able to help them,” Xavier murmured. “I think we’re going to have problems of our own.”

A stage light crashed to the floor only a foot away from Wynonna.

“I think you may be right.”

 

+++

 

“Put pressure on it,” Nicole said quietly, sitting in the corner of the stairwell and pushing Waverly’s hand against a deep gash in the shorter woman’s thigh.

“What, are we in a _Scream_ movie now? I’m pretty sure that line’s in every one.”

“If we are, I certainly hope we’re two of the ones that live.”

Waverly gritted her teeth and winced. “ _Son_ of a _bitch_ that hurt.”

Nicole brushed Waverly’s hair off of her face gently. “That’s what you get for taunting a ghost and then running past a fire axe.”

“It wasn’t my best plan in the world, no.”

“We have to keep moving.”

Waverly gave a low, pained laugh. “Easier said than done, Nic.”

Nicole grabbed Waverly’s backpack and started rifling through it.

“What are you doing?”

“I know you.” She pulled out a roll of duct tape. “Very well.”

“That’s going to suck.”

“More than bleeding to death?”

Waverly paused. “Do it.”

After about a minute, Nicole stood and carefully pulled Waverly up.

“How is it?”

“Hurts like hell.”

Nicole studied Waverly’s leg for a moment in the dim light. “It’s not bleeding for the moment, at least.”

Waverly laughed softly. “Look at that. You think on your feet.”

“Yeah, well, I’ll congratulate myself if we get out of here alive.”

“You won’t be able to congratulate yourself if you’re dead.”

Nicole put an arm around Waverly to steady her and sighed. “You’re a smartass.”

“We’re perfect for each other then.”

“I won’t argue with that.”

 

+++

 

“This sucks,” Xavier snarled as he rolled out of the way of a collapsing spotlight. “These ghosts need to come up with better ways to try to kill us.”

Doc snorted. “The last time they did that, they burned the building down around us.”

An electrical outlet sparked above them, catching one of the curtains on fire.

Wynonna smacked Doc on the arm. “ _YOU HAD TO SAY IT._ ”

Xavier gave a soft groan. “Nedley’s going to kill us.”

Doc broke off a piece of a metal lighting frame and started to try to use it to pry open the door. “I really don’t think that should be our biggest priority right now, Xavier.”

“When have we ever had good priorities?” Wynonna muttered.

“Doc, no offense, but you’re never going to get that door open,” Xavier said.

“Could you do better?” Doc challenged.

Xavier took the bar, jammed it into the lock, and ripped the door open.

Doc stared at him. “Show off.”

“Boys, measure later. Run now.”

 

+++

 

Waverly and Nicole ended up in the basement, and the moment they got there they realized they had made a mistake. The doors of the prop room were shaking so badly they looked about to rip off their hinges, and ceiling tiles were falling down around them.

“Ow, _son of a_ -” Nicole pulled Waverly against the wall as a ceiling panel smacked her in the head, knocking off her hat and giving her a gash on her temple.

“You okay?” Waverly asked.

“I don’t have time to think about that right now.”

The sound of the fire alarm started screeching through the building.

“Now I _really_ don’t have time to think about that.”

“Those dumbasses taunted the ghosts into setting this place on fire, didn’t they?”

Someone pounded on the door next to them, and they heard Bobo shouting threats at them.

Nicole winced. “I don’t think we get to judge.”

“Fair enough.”

The door swung open and Bobo walked into the hallway, not reacting at all as the door slammed shut behind him. He started walking slowly towards Nicole and Waverly, who backed up down the hall.

“You know, I didn’t want to kill you at first. I was just trying to scare you off. That’s why that floor collapse didn’t seriously hurt you and Wynonna, Nicole. But then your little _Black Badge Division_ just wouldn’t _stop_. You would not _back off_. So I had to get more serious. More threatening. I had to start dropping _bodies_. I had to start attacking you _directly_. And you idiots still! You _still_ wouldn’t go away! And you wouldn’t even _die_! I’m sick of this. I’m sick of all of you. I’m bringing all of down just like I’m bringing these buildings down.”

“I understand that,” Waverly said, gripping the sleeve of Nicole’s sweatshirt tightly. “That’s understandable. You hate us. We’re annoying. I do have one question, though? If I could ask it before you murder us?”

“ _What is it?_ ”

“Why the hell didn’t you just, I dunno, use dynamite? Literally anything easier than ghosts.”

“I met a woman at a supernatural convention. When she found out what school I was from, she was ecstatic. Told me that Ii was at a hub for ghostly energy.” Bobo laughed. “I figured she was nuts, but I took her suggestions and tried them out. And they worked _gloriously_. The spirits did anything that I asked when I summoned them to a location. Any bit of destruction I asked for, they would fulfill. So why not destroy some buildings with a method that can’t be tracked back to me?”

“Glad we’ve cleared that up,” Waverly said, leaning against Nicole as her injured leg started to weaken.

“Are we done now?” Bobo asked. “Can I kill you both now?”

Nicole glanced at Waverly, and they both smirked. “Oh, we’re done,” Nicole said. “But I don’t think you’re going to be killing us.”

“And why is that? You think I’m going to have mercy?”

“Nope.”

Bobo was hit on the back of the head by a metal pipe by Wynonna, who had entered the basement behind him with Xavier and Doc.

“Your ghost friends just don’t watch your back very well,” Waverly said.

“You okay, baby girl?” Wynonna asked.

“Been better. You?”

“Yeah, I think I-”

A ceiling tile struck Wynonna in the head, and she let out a stream of expletives.

“Right,” Xavier said. “Ghosts. Collapsing building. Fire. Leave.”

“Bring the asshole,” Nicole said, gesturing at Bobo.

Doc gave an irritated sigh. “ _Fine_.”

He and Xavier grabbed the older man and dragged him along as they kicked open the fire exit and left Remington Hall.

 

+++

 

On the grass outside of Remington Hall, the Black Badge Division sat and watched the building burn.

“Well, that was a success,” Wynonna said sarcastically as she checked on Waverly.

“Your definition of ‘success’ is an interesting one.” Nicole lied down on the ground, wiping blood off of her forehead. “We got another building set on fire, we bashed somebody in the head with a pipe, and three of us are bleeding.”

“Doc and I successfully avoided injury, though.” Xavier high-fived the other man.

“Oh, go to hell.” Wynonna squinted up at the theatre. “We aren’t dead, that’s a success.”

“We unmasked the monster,” Waverly pointed out. “That’s a success.”

“The creepy haunted building is going to burn to the ground,” Doc added. “Also a success.”

“There’s something wrong with you guys.”

Waverly weakly hit Nicole’s leg. “You’re just as bad as we are.”

“It’s possible.”

“She’s certainly as sarcastic as the rest of us,” Wynonna muttered.

For some reason, this made Xavier start laughing. One by one, they all joined him.

Their laughter mixed in with the sound of sirens approaching from the road and the fading music of a piano dripping out of Remington Hall.

 

+++

 

**MARCH 18**

 

“You’re not allowed to make a left here,” Chrissy said casually from the passenger seat of her own car.

Waverly, in the driver’s seat, rolled her eyes. “Everyone makes a left turn here.”

“It’s illegal.”

“Chrissy, everyone turns left out of this parking garage.”

“Everyone but me, because I don’t want to get a ticket.”

“Yeah, well, I’m the one driving, so you don’t need to worry about it.”

Chrissy snorted and rubbed the back of her neck. “Don’t get my car towed.”

“Pessimist.” Waverly turned out of the garage. Moments later, she flinched as the flashing lights of a campus police cruiser appeared behind her.

“Realist,” Chrissy countered.

“Oh, shut up.” Waverly pulled over and sighed, rolling down her window and reaching into her bag for her I.D.

Chrissy glanced out the back window at the cop getting out of the car and immediately started laughing.

“What? What’s so funny?”

“License and- oh, fuck me.”

Waverly paused, a grin slowly forming on her face. She turned to the window and saw Nicole using one hand to lean against the car and the other pinch the bridge of her nose.

“The only way that’s happening is if you walk away now, Officer.”

“Waverly, come on, I _just_ got my job back.”

“Well, I don’t see how pulling over your boss’s daughter’s car is going to make a good impression. Besides, Nedley doesn’t need to know about any of this.”

Chrissy shrugged. “She has a point Nicole. Plus, really, who are you more afraid of? Waverly, or my dad?”

“Whose side are you on, Chrissy?” Nicole demanded.

“Whichever side will give me the most amusing story to tell Wynonna later.”

“Come on now, Nicky. You don’t _really_ want to give _me_ a ticket.” Waverly tapped a finger against Nicole’s belt buckle. “It really wouldn’t be in your best interest.”

“We both know you would crack in a day,” Nicole said.

Waverly smirked. “We both know you’ll never take that chance.”

Nicole groaned softly and rested her forehead against the top of the car. “Wave, please don’t do this to me.”

“Do what?” Waverly asked innocently.

“You’re the worst person I’ve ever met in my life.”

Waverly grabbed Nicole’s jacket and pulled her forward against the car. “Now _that_ is _not_ true. I just have no interest in paying a traffic ticket that you have no business giving me.”

“This is extortion. This is a felony.”

“Your point?” Waverly asked, grinning.

Nicole groaned again and rubbed her eyes with a gloved hand. “I’m going home. I’m quitting my job. It’s safer for my health.”

Waverly released Nicole’s jacket and leaned back against her seat. “That’s being a little bit dramatic, don’t you think, Nicky?”

Nicole leaned down in the driver’s side window, shaking her head. “No reaction to you is dramatic. You’re an asshole.”

“Shut up, Nicole.” Waverly grabbed her by her collar and kissed her quickly. “Go back to your patrol.”

Shaking her head again, Nicole looked at Chrissy. “Why am I doing this to myself? Your roommate is awful.”

“My roommate is _fantastic_ ,” Chrissy said, laughing. “And you’re _whipped_.”

“I-I’m not…” Nicole mumbled under her breath for a moment before tapping her finger against Waverly’s forehead. “Stop driving badly so I don’t have to pull you over again.”

“Yeah, yeah.”

As Nicole walked away, Chrissy laughed again. “God, I was right. She’s even more gone for you than even _you_ thought.”

“Oh, leave her alone.”

“You just _ripped her apart_ , and you’re telling _me_ to leave her alone?” Chrissy asked incredulously.

Waverly shrugged. “I really only did that so viciously because I had a witness. So it was all your fault.”

“Well, you’re welcome.” Chrissy leaned back in her seat. “You’re going to marry her someday, you know.”

“What?” Waverly asked quickly, looking at her roommate in shock.

“You are! You’re ridiculous and in love and you’re going to marry her someday.”

Flushed red, Waverly put the car back in drive. “I’ll put you back in the hospital, Nedley.”

Chrissy chuckled and patted Waverly on the leg. “You’re only saying that because you know I’m right.”

Waverly glanced in the rearview mirror at the campus cop getting back into her patrol car. “Yeah,” she murmured. “You probably are.”

 

+++

 

**MARCH 22**

 

Xavier walked into the library study room where Wynonna and Doc were both sitting and reading. He tossed a shirt down on the table. “This was on my door this morning.”

Wynonna picked it up and looked at it. It was a black t-shirt with BLACK BADGE DIVISION written on the front in white font. On the back was DOLLS in the same font.

She laughed. “Oh my God, you got one too. There was one on my door as well. Waverly said she and Nicole got them also.”

“Doc?”

He nodded, not looking up from his textbook.

“Where did they come from?” Xavier asked, sitting down across from Wynonna. “One of us would’ve had to have made them, right?”

“I have no idea, but it’s hilarious, and we need to wear them every day.” Wynonna leaned back in her chair. “Nedley wants us to testify against Bobo Del Ray.”

“What did they charge him with again?” Doc asked.

“Uh, destruction of property, arson, assault, and attempted murder. They couldn’t prove he killed the girl in Remington Hall.”

“I suppose we’ll have to give our evidence. It’s better than staying quiet and possibly letting him get off. If he’s going to be drawing any more of those creepy symbols, I’d rather he do it in prison.” Xavier took his laptop out of his bag.

“I agree.” Wynonna looked down at her cellphone. “Wave is calling me. I’ll be right back.”

She stood and ducked out of the room. Doc started laughing quietly.

“What’s so funny, Holliday?” Xavier asked gruffly.

“You’re not going to tell her that you made the shirts?”

“I did not,” he insisted.

“Uh huh. You’re a shitty actor, Mr. Dolls.”

“Shut the hell up, John Henry.”

Wynonna walked back into the room and took her seat. “She and Nicole are going to be late. Something about a Dragonite by the dorm that they want to catch.”

“Your sister and her girlfriend are nerds.”

“I’m very well aware of that, Xavier.” Wynonna opened her book back up and continued flipping through it.

“What are you reading?” Xavier asked.

She held up the book so he could see the title: _Phantom of the Pines: More Tales of the Jersey Devil_.

“New Jersey is a little far away from us, don’t you think?”

“It seemed like an interesting think to look into, after everything we’ve been through. In fact, I’m thinking that I know what we should all go to grad school for.”

“What would that be?” Doc prompted.

Wynonna smirked. “Cryptozoology.”


End file.
